Throughout almost any historical college program’s history, there are heroes and villains. Michigan’s Tim Biakabutuka comes to mind when singling out one of many Ohio State villains, but there are Buckeye figures that are the same to other programs.
For one of the historical heavy punchers like USC, a choice of villains might be harder to find, but they are there. In fact, according to one of our sister sites Trojans Wire, one such figure is none other than former Ohio State head coach Woody Hayes.
Hayes didn’t dominate USC, but his teams often stood in the way of the Trojans’ ultimate goal of bigger things in some monumental Rose Bowl matchups between the two behemoths of the time.
From Matt Zemek of Trojans Wire:
“In the 1955, 1969, and 1974 Rose Bowls, Hayes guided the Buckeyes to a victory over the Trojans — twice over John McKay, once over Jess Hill. USC’s Rose Bowl wins over Ohio State in 1980 and 1985 occurred against Earle Bruce, who replaced Hayes at the end of the 1978 season. Hayes was a very formidable adversary.”
“Woody Hayes didn’t dominate USC, but he did stand in the way of the Trojans in two Rose Bowl games. The 1969 Rose Bowl win over USC denied the Men of Troy the ability to claim they were the best team in America for two straight seasons; USC won the 1967 national championship and was hoping to stand on top of the mountain in the 1968 season. Ohio State said no.”
Great USC sports villains: Woody Hayes https://t.co/C9t5Yl2c8h
— USC Trojans Wire (@TrojansWire) June 14, 2020
You can read more perspective on Zemek’s well thought out take on why Hayes is one of the ultimate historical villains for yourself, but there’s no doubt he put a monkey wrench in the best-laid plans of the Men of Troy on more than one occasion.
The fact that these two blue-bloods haven’t matched up in Pasadena since 1985 is awfully hard to believe.
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