The USC Trojans’ next game is on Super Bowl Sunday. Their opponent, Oregon State, is 11-13 overall and 3-10 in the Pac-12 Conference. That might suggest the Beavers are a bad team. It’s not the reality.
Of course, a team with an 11-13 record isn’t especially good. “You are what you are,” as the saying goes. However, Oregon State isn’t a bad team. It is a bad late-game team, but in the first 35 minutes of a game, the Beavers are extremely tough.
Oregon State has been narrowly missing out on big wins all season. The Beavers lost at Arizona by three points. They lost to Washington State by seven. They lost to Stanford by only three and Utah by only two. That’s a pair of top-10 teams the Beavers very nearly defeated.
This Friday at UCLA, the Beavers led 47-42 late in the third quarter but let that lead slip away against the Bruins.
Oregon State is playing a lot of good teams on relatively even terms. It just isn’t making the handful of plays it needs to make in the final three minutes of games.
USC needs to realize the surface win-loss records — overall and in the Pac-12 — don’t do justice to Oregon State. The Beavers are very tough, and the Trojans need to know they’re going to be in for a rough ride on Sunday.
Buckle up.
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