USC to not play Notre Dame for the first time since 1945

No Irish

The Pac-12 was the next major conference to announce a massive shakeup in their scheduling for this fall’s football season. The Pac-12 joined the Big Ten in playing a conference-only schedule should the football season take place this fall. The news was first reported by Nicole Auerbach of The Athletic and then confirmed by the official announcement from the Pac-12 just moments ago.

With the Trojans playing a conference-only schedule, this means they will not play their biggest non-UCLA rival within one of college football’s longest-running inter-sectional rivalries. Yes, USC will not play the Notre Dame Fighting Irish for the first time since 1945. The last time the Trojans didn’t play the Irish was the 1943-’45 window during World War II. Coronavirus (and, one could argue, bad American governance) will now be the reason they don’t play for the first time in 75 years.

The Trojans will also avoid playing the Alabama Crimson Tide to open the season. In this specific sense, the Trojans likely dodged a bullet. The Crimson Tide were favorites to win the SEC and compete for a national championship come the winter. With everything up in the air and little time to prepare for these games, it’s probably a good idea that this game isn’t being played. It’s the highest level of football you can get; a lack of prep time is the easiest way to ensure injuries on both teams.

You simply need more time to play a game like this and the powers that be couldn’t do that safely. To that end, it’s a good thing that USC and Alabama will not play this year, but let’s hope the two schools find a way to reschedule a game that would be highly entertaining. It deserves to be played when the country isn’t being swarmed by a pandemic.

Another team that will lose out on playing USC is New Mexico. Similar to the Alabama game but inverted, it’s probably a good thing for New Mexico that the Lobos won’t have to play USC for all the reasons listed above; injuries and lack of prep time just don’t bode well for a team with an already glaring physical deficiency in this game. The Lobos will lose a good paycheck, though, and that’s the type of stuff that helps fund other programs.