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USC drops hype video ahead of matchup with Utah

Wade-Peeryby: Wade Peery10/21/23

The USC Trojans were dealt a stunning 48-20 defeat last week at the hands of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. They’ll look to rebound this weekend as they go against yet another quality opponent, the Utah Utes. Utah has dealt with some injuries in the past few weeks, but this weekend should pose yet another stiff challenge for the Trojans.

Check out the hype video they dropped on Friday night.

The Trojans are counting on some inspiration from a Los Angeles legend in their hype video, none other than former Lakers legend, Kobe Bryant.

Rece Davis gives his pick in USC vs. Utah

Last year, Utah was the only Pac-12 team to beat USC. The Utes beat the Trojans once in the regular season and again in the conference championship to likely keep Lincoln Riley and Co. out of the College Football Playoff.

The two teams will meet again on Friday, and things are much different for the Trojans. USC is coming off a 48-20 loss to Notre Dame in last week’s rivalry matchup as Caleb Williams threw for three interceptions for the first time in his career. Riley’s group will undoubtedly be looking to bounce back and enter the game as a 6.5-point favorites, according to FanDuel.

ESPN’s Rece Davis logged his pick on the College GameDay podcast. He knows the risk of doing so, but he’s rolling with the Trojans to not only win outright, but cover the spread.

“This is sort of a hold-your-nose-and-do-it, but I’m gonna I’m gonna go with Fight On,” Davis said. “I’m gonna say back against the wall, home game — which we saw Utah maybe not play its best game when it went to Southern California last year and played against UCLA in the Rose Bowl stadium for that game.

“So I’m going to say USC wins. I’m gonna say they win it by a touchdown and they keep their hope alive for at least another week or two.”

Why Utah is ‘better equipped’ to deal with Caleb Williams, USC

Last season, Utah went punch for punch against USC in their first meeting en route to the 43-42 victory. Then, in the conference title game, the Utes held the Trojans to 24 points — and kept Williams to 28 of 41 passing — to win 47-24.

Davis cited someone he knows who covers Utah, and the sense around the program is defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley is comfortable with his ability to build a game plan against Riley and the Trojans. However, Davis added USC is going to be out to prove something after last week’s showing, which could make things tough for the Utes.

Nonetheless, if there’s a team that can keep Williams and the USC offense at bay, it’s Utah.

“I had a guy tell me who’s close to the Utah program — not a part of it, a guy who’s covered the Utah program for a long time — that they feel really confident about the way Morgan Scalley can scheme against Lincoln Riley,” Davis said. “I just, I don’t like the spot for Utah with USC being up against it, coming off an embarrassing game, Caleb Williams with an uncharacteristic three turnovers. The one thing that does give me pause is obviously, maybe Utah does an even exaggerated version of what Notre Dame did in terms of getting pressure on Caleb Williams. We even saw Arizona do a good job of making life difficult and chasing him out of the pocket.

“And Utah is probably — as we saw a couple times last year — better suited to deal with it when he does, if anybody’s suited to deal with it when that guy starts running around and creating. Utah as as some trouble scoring. The one thing USC’s defense has done well is get to the quarterback, create some negative plays. But they give up a bunch.”

On3’s Nick Schultz also contributed to this article.