USC-Notre Dame game-day musings: second half and beyond

• It's pretty hard to render me speechless, but I was close to it for the latter half of this beat down. Much of the time was spent watching more intriguing games on Justin.tv.
• Notre Dame finished with 91 yards of total offense. We see 91-yard plays every week on "SportsCenter."
• Mark Sanchez was especially elusive tonight. It's been a few weeks since I've said it ... it's fun to watch him play.
• Notre Dame didn't get a first down until late in the third quarter, and received a standing ovation for it. From both sides. The Irish moved the chains only four times all game, pretty much entirely in garbage time.
• Reported celebrity sightings included John Stamos, Jerry Seinfeld, LenDale "I Hate UCLA" White, and two-time ESPY winner Taryne Mowatt (the former Arizona softball star seemed pretty happy with how this one turned out).
• Scouts from the Detroit Lions, Atlanta Falcons, Oakland Raiders, Arizona Cardinals, New York Giants and Chicago Bears were on hand. So was a representative from the Sugar Bowl. That's probably irrelevant, since Oregon State lost to Oregon and USC looks like a lock for the Rose Bowl (or a really, really longshot for the BCS title game).
• After the game, Pete Carroll wouldn't say that this was his best defense ever, but he said they were playing the best.
• One fan summed it up nicely: "This game was over three weeks ago."
• Area for improvement: Once again, USC was heavily penalized (eight for 95 yards) while its opponent was rarely flagged (two for 22 yards).
• Injury report: Nick Howell suffered a right high ankle sprain and Stanley Havili suffered a mild ankle sprain. That's it.
• Final score: USC 38, Notre Dame 3.

-- Adam Rose

Photo by Wally Skalij/LA Times

Comments

[pk-mesa]

That was a great game and now on to the Tiddy Bowl and Westwood HS

[dee]

I'll be interested to know how Pete Carroll deals with Malik Jackson (#97) and his actions on field tonight. First with the personal foul and then fighting and getting ejected on the very next play? I was most certainly NOT impressed by his boneheaded behavior and actually cheered when he was forced to sit his ass down.