watch USC win a 12th Football National Championship

A USC season that went south in the second half will conclude with a bowl game up north.

The Trojans will play Boston College in the Emerald Bowl on Dec. 26 at AT&T Park in San Francisco, it was announced Sunday.

Kickoff is at 5 p.m., and the game will be televised by ESPN.

Both USC and Boston College are 8-4.

The Trojans are playing a postseason game somewhere other than the Rose Bowl for the first time since the 2004 season.

“I think it’s a good matchup with Boston College, a good chance to get a new setting for us,” said Coach Pete Carroll, who was born in San Francisco and grew up in Marin County. “It’s going home for me.”

USC lost out on a Holiday Bowl bid by losing to Arizona in its regular-season finale. The Trojans finished 5-4 in the Pacific 10 Conference and 24th in the Bowl Championship Series standings.

On Sunday, they tumbled out of the Associated Press top-25 media poll, where they had been a fixture since the start of the 2002 season.

“We’re going into this with an opportunity to get a couple more weeks of practice,” Carroll said.

With final exams coming up and the game less than three weeks away, however, USC will not use the maximum 15 workouts allowed under NCAA rules.

Senior safety Taylor Mays said after the Arizona loss that the Trojans would be motivated for a bowl game despite a season that fell well below expectations.

“We like playing football,” he said. “We get excited for practice, so playing in a game obviously will be exciting for us. It’s not going to matter.”

Senior cornerback Kevin Thomas agreed.

“It’s not going to be tough to get up for the bowl game because it’s one more chance to play together and play well,” he said.

USC is 6-2 in bowl games under Carroll. With the exception of the 2001 Las Vegas Bowl against Utah, the Trojans have mostly played well in the postseason. USC defeated Iowa in the Orange Bowl and beat Michigan, Illinois and Penn State in the Rose Bowl. USC routed Oklahoma in the 2005 BCS title game in Florida and came up short against Texas in the 2006 championship game at the Rose Bowl.

Boston College, under first-year Coach Frank Spaziani, finished 5-3 in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

The Eagles feature running back Montel Harris, who has rushed for 1,355 yards and 13 touchdowns.

Quarterback Dave Shinskie, who played minor league baseball for six seasons, has completed 53% of his passes. Shinskie has passed for 14 touchdowns, with 13 interceptions.

Linebacker Luke Kuechly averages 11.8 tackles a game.

USC and Boston College shared only one common opponent this season: Notre Dame.

The Trojans defeated the Fighting Irish, 34-27, on Oct. 17 at South Bend, Ind. The next week, Boston College lost at Notre Dame, 20-16.

The Eagles’ other defeats were at Clemson and Virginia Tech and at home against North Carolina.

USC has played Boston College twice, winning, 23-17, in 1987 and, 34-7, in 1988. The schools are scheduled to have a home-and-home series in 2013 and 2014.

LOS ANGELES (AP) -Juron Criner stumbled into the end zone with a 36-yard touchdown pass from Nick Foles with 3:14 to play, and Arizona wrapped up its best regular season in a decade Saturday with a 21-17 victory over not-so-mighty Southern California.

Foles passed for 239 yards and two TDs and ran for another score for the Wildcats (8-4, 6-3 Pac-10), who finally beat No. 20 USC for the first time in coach Mike Stoops’ tenure by scoring the final touchdown in a defense-dominated game.

After Jordan Congdon made a 37-yard field goal with 7:13 left to put the Trojans (8-4, 5-4) ahead, Arizona converted three straight third downs on the decisive drive. Criner then caught a long fade pass and fought through a tackle into the end zone, silencing the nearly half-empty Coliseum crowd watching USC’s second home loss in three games.

The Trojans were 47-1 at the Coliseum before last month’s loss to Stanford, but their second home defeat finished off the most embarrassing season of coach Pete Carroll’s remarkable tenure.

Arizona secured a share of second place in the Pac-10 with its first eight-win regular season since 1998 by knocking off a ranked team for the sixth straight season under Stoops, who has finally beaten every team in the conference.

Foles struggled in a 22-of-40 performance, but made several big throws – including an early TD pass to Delashaun Dean set up by an interception – while the Wildcats played again without leading rusher Nic Grigsby, who has a sprained shoulder.

Not even Senior Day could coax any consistency out of the dismal USC offense led by Matt Barkley, who went 20 of 37 for 144 yards with the 12th interception of his rocky freshman season. Allen Bradford rushed for 66 yards and a tying touchdown late in the third quarter, and Ronald Johnson caught a TD pass.

After beginning the season in search of their eighth straight Pac-10 title and BCS bowl berth, the Trojans are likely to finish in sixth place. A victory over Arizona likely would have put them in the Holiday Bowl, but now they could be headed for a more humbling trip to San Diego for the Poinsettia Bowl.

USC couldn’t get a first down on its ensuing drive after Criner’s catch, with Barkley throwing three straight incompletions – including a fourth-down throw over the head of Damian Williams, who was open down the middle. USC got the ball back with seven seconds left, but Barkley was sacked by Earl Mitchell.

Both teams already played their traditional season-ending rivalry games last week, with USC beating UCLA 28-7 and Arizona holding off Arizona State 20-17.

With USC wrapping up its least successful season since 2001, the Coliseum had tens of thousands of empty seats under appropriately cloudy skies. The Trojans were mostly lifeless early, trailing 14-7 at halftime and managing just 120 yards of offense in the first half.

Joe McKnight managed just 35 yards while playing with a bruised thigh, but still became the Trojans’ first 1,000-yard rusher since 2005 with a short rush in the fourth quarter.

Stafon Johnson, the USC tailback who nearly died in a weightlifting accident that ended his season in September, was the last of USC’s seniors to take the field in pregame introductions. Johnson, who wore his jersey and a stocking cap as he posed for pictures with his mother and teammates, still hasn’t decided whether he’ll attempt to return for another season.

LOS ANGELES (AP) – When Matt Barkley kneeled down to end Southern California’s victory in the final minute, UCLA defiantly stopped the clock with a timeout.

So the Trojans let ‘er rip, throwing a long touchdown pass and then celebrating it with a taunting ferocity that brought the Bruins onto the field on the verge of a brawl.
The last 90 seconds of Los Angeles’ 79th crosstown showdown had more action than the first 58 1/2 minutes, even if it was just a few extra fireworks at the close of No. 24 USC’s workmanlike 28-7 victory Saturday night.

Malcolm Smith returned one of USC’s three interceptions 62 yards for an early touchdown for the Trojans (8-3, 5-3 Pac-10), who regained their defensive pride while maintaining their city dominance.

Yet those in the non-sellout Coliseum crowd who left early missed most of the good stuff in an otherwise lusterless game between two opponents in brightly colored home jerseys.

“You’re either competing or you’re not,” USC coach Pete Carroll said. “We’ve been saying it for years. We’ve been living it for years. If you really believe in competing, if you really do, you’ll understand it.”

When the Bruins stopped USC’s attempt to run out the clock, offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates dialed up a play-action pass with Carroll’s eager approval. Barkley’s 48-yard throw down the middle to Damian Williams with 44 seconds left led to an ebullient USC celebration that nearly set off an all-out fight.

“No, we weren’t going to fight – but I put my helmet on and my mouthpiece in, just in case,” Barkley said, grinning.

The Trojans jumped, yelled and gestured on their sideline before moving onto the field in unison in a teamwide taunt of the Bruins (6-6, 3-6), who then came across midfield to challenge them before coaches and officials kept them apart.

“They were excited, they were taunting, and we wanted to let them know we weren’t going anywhere,” UCLA linebacker Reggie Carter said. “I don’t take offense. If we were winning, I would have done the exact same thing. I still shook hands with everybody on that team.”

Incredibly, no penalties were called for the faceoff, although UCLA got two personal fouls for in-game infractions in the final seconds. UCLA’s coaches herded most of their players to the locker room without the customary postgame handshakes.

Both Carroll and UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel didn’t see the final touchdown as a pile-it-on score, noting the Trojans were only ahead by 14 points and had tried to run out the clock.

“Our job is to cover, and they have every right to throw deep,” Neuheisel said. “People can make their own conclusions. Our job is to stop the play. ... I don’t blame them for doing it.”

Allen Bradford ran for 62 yards and two TDs, including a score with 1:30 to play, as the Trojans rebounded splendidly from the worst defensive performance in USC history.

USC has won three straight over UCLA – allowing just 21 total points – since the Trojans’ 13-9 loss to UCLA in 2006. But the long-mighty Trojans staggered into the Coliseum with two blowout losses in their last three games and their lowest ranking since 2001.

The Trojans gave up 47 points to Oregon and a school-record 55 to Stanford in the past three games, but UCLA barely threatened to score until the final minutes. USC constantly rattled UCLA freshman quarterback Kevin Prince, and Will Harris’ interception set up Bradford’s first TD run early in the second half.

USC limited the Bruins to 180 yards and no points in the first three quarters, more than making up for the Trojans’ unabated offensive struggles under Barkley, who passed for 206 yards in his first crosstown game. USC also lost starting tailback Joe McKnight on the first drive of the second half to a thigh injury.

“You come here knowing how big this rivalry is, and how much it means to everybody in this city,” Barkley said. “I’m going to remember this one.”

The Bruins barely moved until senior quarterback Kevin Craft relieved Prince, who sprained his right shoulder, in the second half. Fullback Chane Moline scored their only TD on a 2-yard direct snap with 5:41 to play.

But Barkley then made perhaps his best throw, hitting Ronald Johnson with a 20-yard pass on third down with less than 2 1/2 minutes to play. Bradford rumbled 21 yards to the UCLA 2 on the next play before scoring.

USC then took over on downs near midfield with 54 seconds left, sealing the Trojans’ 10th win in the last 11 meetings – and setting up those late shenanigans.

Craft passed for 98 yards and Prince had 90 for the Bruins, whose three-game winning streak ended. The Bruins are bowl-eligible, but they’re the seventh-place team in a strong conference with just six automatic bowl affiliations.

Both teams marched into the Coliseum wearing their home jerseys, a long-dormant tradition revived last season by USC at the Rose Bowl. UCLA even went a step further with the powder-blue 1967 throwback jerseys that the Bruins first wore in a win over Washington three weeks earlier to snap a five-game skid.

But all the color was in the uniforms, not the dull play. USC led 7-0 after a 10-punt first half, the rivalry’s lowest-scoring first half in 33 years.

Prince made the half’s biggest mistake when he lost sight of Smith, throwing a short slant pass right into the USC linebacker’s numbers in the first quarter. Smith outran Prince down the UCLA sideline, showing off the speed he shares with his brother, former Trojans receiver Steve Smith.

LOS ANGELES (AP) -Toby Gerhart rushed for 178 yards and three touchdowns and No. 25 Stanford emphatically followed up its 2007 upset at the Coliseum by beating No. 11 Southern California on Saturday 55-21.

Andrew Luck threw two touchdown passes and ran for another score for the Cardinal (7-3, 6-2 Pac-10), who followed up their surprising rout of Oregon last week with a strong start and a big finish at the Coliseum, where the Trojans (7-3, 4-3) haven’t lost to any other opponent since 2001, going 47-2.

“To do that against a storied program, a perennial power, it’s the greatest feeling in the world,” said the Pac-10 rushing leader, whose Heisman Trophy hopes are gaining momentum. “It was just will. The offensive line just moved people. We got after them and got downhill, and it was just a good offensive day.”

How good? The loss was the Trojans’ worst since a 51-0 defeat at home against Notre Dame in 1966. Coach Pete Carroll lost in November for the first time at USC after 28 straight victories. And for the second time in three weekends, Carroll endured the worst loss of his nine seasons.

“I’m not sure I have the right words to describe being humbled like this,” Carroll said. “I don’t really know where to put it. ... We have fallen apart and given our opponents the opportunity to do whatever they want, but you have to give Stanford a lot of credit.”

Richard Sherman returned an interception 42 yards for a score with 11:41 to play, part of a 27-point fourth quarter for the Cardinal. After the postgame handshsake, the Cardinal raised their helmets and raced to their cheering section for their second celebration at the Coliseum in three years.

Stanford’s 24-23 victory as a 41-point underdog in 2007 was a major shocker, yet this win barely even qualified as an upset. That might be the most incredible thing of all about the Trojans’ downward slide, which will end with a minor bowl berth - and with more than two losses - for the first time since 2001.

“We came out there, and there was something wrong,” USC safety Taylor Mays said. “It is very disappointing. It’s almost sickening. To be a senior and leave a legacy like this, it’s sickening.”

Two weeks after USC’s 47-20 loss at Oregon, the Trojans’ defense gave up 469 yards.

Barkley went 21 of 31 for 196 yards with three interceptions for the Trojans. Carroll has stuck with the freshman all season, but Barkley made turnovers on USC’s first two drives to put the Trojans in an early 14-0 hole.

When Sherman jumped on Barkley’s short pass and returned it down the USC sideline to put the Cardinal up 42-21, Coliseum fans headed for the exits with unfamiliar emotions.

“This isn’t what we grew up watching,” Barkley said. “I’m not used to this. ... I don’t know what to think right now.”

Joe McKnight rushed for 142 yards and a score for the Trojans, who fell behind 21-7 at halftime without top receiver Damian Williams, who has a sprained ankle. Brice Butler caught a scoring pass among his six catches for 96 yards, but USC’s offense rarely found a rhythm after its first drive ended in a fumble by Barkley deep in Stanford territory.

After Gerhart’s third touchdown, Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh even attempted a 2-point conversion, but USC stopped the try at the goal line.

Harbaugh’s explanation for trying to pile on a couple more points: “I just honestly thought there was an opportunity coming off the ball, the way our backs were running and the way we were playing.”

Said Carroll: “I don’t know what they were thinking with that, but in that situation, they get to do whatever they want.”

TEMPE, Ariz. (AP)—USC is back in the defense business.

Will Harris returned an interception 55 yards for a touchdown-one of four turnovers forced by the Trojans-and No. 12 USC held on for a shaky 14-9 victory over Arizona State on Saturday night.

A week ago, the Trojans’ once-proud defense conceded 47 points to Oregon in the worst loss in the Carroll era. The defense regrouped against an ASU team with relatively little firepower.

“That last game against Oregon, it made us realize that we’ve got to come back and do things right, and that’s what we did,” said Harris, who also picked off a desperation pass in the end zone as time expired.

USC hadn’t lost back-to-back games since a four-game skid in Carroll’s first year, 2001.

Thanks to the defense, it still hasn’t.

With nine penalties for 98 yards, USC did all it could to keep ASU in the game. But the Trojans (7-2, 4-2 Pac-10) survived and stayed in the hunt for an eighth straight Bowl Championship Series berth.

“We were determined to win the football game from start to finish, and do stuff that it took to win,” Carroll said. “On this night, it took a great defensive effort.”

Matt Barkley threw a 75-yard pass to Damian Williams for what turned out to be the decisive score, but Barkley also put his team in a tight spot with his lone interception, in the fourth quarter. He completed 7 of 22 passes for 112 yards and a touchdown.

With USC’s offense sputtering behind Barkley, the Trojans turned to a unit that seemed helpless in a 47-20 loss at Eugene one week earlier.

“To get back on track defensively is really obviously important to us,” Carroll said. “It’s such a good night to get four turnovers.”

The defense responded as USC defeated ASU (4-5, 2-4) for the 10th straight time. But early on it looked like a rerun of the Oregon debacle.

On the opening possession, the Trojans let the punchless Sun Devils march to the USC 13-yard line before freshman tailback Cameron Marshall fumbled on a hit by Christian Tupou. USC cornerback Josh Pinkard recovered.

ASU threatened again late in the second quarter but had to settle for a 21-yard field goal by Thomas Weber.

Then USC’s defense turned in the pivotal play.

Harris picked off a Danny Sullivan pass along the left sideline and romped 55 yards for a touchdown. Harris said he could tell by ASU’s formation that a quick pass was coming.

“I hopped it,” he said.

ASU coach Dennis Erickson was still fuming about the play after the game.

“To throw the pick six is … ridiculous,” Erickson said.

Harris was also flagged 15 yards for unsportsmanlike conduct for high-stepping into the end zone.

USC made it 14-3 on an electrifying play early in the second half.

On second and nine at the USC 25, Barkley dumped the ball to Williams in the right flat. Williams waited for his blockers, then cut back across the field and streaked toward the goalline.

ASU cornerback Terell Carr pushed Williams out of bounds as he stretched the football toward the pylon. The officials ruled Williams out at the 2, but USC was awarded a touchdown on review.

That put the Trojans ahead 14-3.

At that point, Erickson pulled Sullivan and brought in 6-foot-8 freshman Brock Osweiler, bringing cheers from the crowd. Sullivan was 12 of 23 for 113 yards, and he threw two interceptions.

This was the change many ASU fans had demanded for weeks. It took three possessions for the Sun Devils to respond.

Osweiler led ASU 80 yards in eight plays, completing all three of his passes for 65 yards. Osweiler kept the drive alive by stiff-arming a tackler and picking up six yards on a bootleg on third-and-3.

Then he found a wide-open Chris McGaha for a 23-yard touchdown in the final minute of the third quarter. USC led 14-9 after Pinkard blocked the point-after try.

Osweiler went 11 for 27 for 153 yards and a score, and he was intercepted once.

“There was opportunities for myself to make plays,” Osweiler said. “I didn’t get the job done.”

ASU fell to 3-28 against the Top 25 since 2000—and 1-7 under Erickson.

With USC clinging to a five-point lead midway through the fourth quarter, USC came up with another big stop.

The Sun Devils took over at USC’s 36 after a fluke interception by ASU’s Clint Floyd. Barkley threw into traffic, and ASU’s Mike Nixon deflected the pass.

The ball caromed to USC’s Brice Butler, who juggled the ball as he collided with a teammate. The ball popped loose, and ASU’s Terell Carr kicked it a foot or so off the turf before Floyd finally latched onto it.

USC dodged that bullet, thanks to an offensive holding call and three misses by Osweiler. who was under heavy pressure.

ASU had one last shot at the upset, taking over at its 22 with 1:56 to play and no timeouts. The Sun Devils reached the USC 45 with 7 seconds left, but Harris picked off Osweiler’s pass into the end zone as time expired.

“I hope we can capitalize on this and keep moving forward,” Carroll said.

EUGENE, Ore. (AP) -Jeremiah Masoli threw for 222 yards and a touchdown and ran for 164 more yards with another score and the No. 10 Oregon Ducks ran past No. 4 USC 47-20 for the Trojans’ worst loss since 1997.

Redshirt freshman LaMichael James ran for 184 yards and a score as the Ducks (7-1, 5-0 Pacific-10) racked up 391 yards on the ground against the Trojans, who came into the game with the fifth-best rush defense in the nation, allowing an average of just 79.9 yards a game.

Southern California (6-2, 3-2) had not lost a game by more than a touchdown since a 27-16 loss to Notre Dame in 2001, Pete Carroll’s first season as Trojans coach. It was USC’s worst lost since a 35-7 defeat to Arizona State on Oct. 11, 1997 and the most points allowed by the Trojans in Carroll’s tenure.

Oregon remained alone in first and undefeated in the Pac-10, threatening USC’s hold on the league championship for the past seven years.

USC freshman quarterback Matt Barkley, who earlier this week predicted he would feed off Autzen’s deafening noise, completed 21 of 38 passes for 187 yards and two scores. He was intercepted once.

Masoli completed 19 of 31 for Oregon, which had never before scored as many points against the Trojans.

USC went up 3-0 on the its first series of the game on Jordan Congdon’s 28-yard field goal. Oregon answered with Morgan Flint’s 32-yarder, but the Ducks had squandered their opportunity after Kenjon Barner’s 77-yard kickoff return.

Masoli scored on a 3-yard run to put the Ducks up 10-3 late in the first quarter. USC tied it with Barkley’s 3-yard pass to Ronald Johnson early in the second.

Oregon went ahead again on Andre Crenshaw’s 1-yard scoring run. And USC tied it again at 17 on Barkley’s 4-yard pass to Damian Williams.

Masoli found Jamere Holland with a 17-yard touchdown pass to put the Ducks back up 24-17 at the half.

After Oregon extended the lead with Flint’s 35-yard field goal, USC narrowed it with Congdon’s 39-yarder.

James scored on a 5-yard run and fellow redshirt freshman Kenjon Barner ran for a 3-yard touchdown to make it 41-20 at the close of the third quarter.

Flint had a pair of field goals from 22 and 23 yards out to pad Oregon’s lead in the fourth quarter.

The Trojans have lost four straight in the state of Oregon.

LOS ANGELES—Most of Oregon State’s punt-coverage team was to his left, so Damian Williams went right. When he dodged the final tackler and slipped into the end zone early in the fourth quarter, he thought Southern California finally had shaken the Beavers as well.

“And then they went down and scored again like it was nothing,” Williams recalled. “I said, ‘I guess it’s still going to be a fight here.’”

The Trojans (No. 7 BCS, No. 4 AP) won that fight with one final drive by their revitalized offense, which relished a rare chance to bail out their usually formidable defense in a 42-36 victory Saturday night.

Allen Bradford rushed for a career-high 147 yards and two touchdowns as USC avenged its only loss of last season—a 27-21 defeat last September that prevented the Trojans (6-1, 3-1 Pac-10) from playing for the national title.

USC’s defense looked nowhere near title shape against Sean Canfield, Jacquizz Rodgers and the Beavers (4-3, 2-2), who shredded it for 482 total yards—including James Rodgers’ 7-yard TD catch less than two minutes after Williams’ 63-yard punt return put the Trojans up 42-23.

Jacquizz Rodgers’ 1-yard TD plunge with 5:41 to play cut USC’s lead to 42-36, but the Trojans converted two third downs while running out the clock, with Bradford picking up one with a stiff-arm in the final minute.

“It was the moment you dream about,” said Bradford, who has spent most of his USC career stuck behind Chauncey Washington and Joe McKnight, who missed much of this game with injured hands. “We knew we had to keep scoring and being consistent to beat these guys. It’s good to pick up the defense, because they’ve been picking us up all year.”

Canfield passed for 329 yards and a career-best three touchdowns for the Beavers, while Jacquizz Rodgers rushed for 113 yards and a score and also caught a TD pass on an injured ankle. Jacquizz Rodgers was the star of Oregon State’s win over then-No. 1 USC last season, but the Trojans still haven’t lost consecutive games to the same opponent since 2002, in the second year of coach Pete Carroll’s tenure.

“I’m very proud of our team for their fight,” said Oregon State coach Mike Riley, whose team hit season highs of nine penalties for 85 yards. “We will regret many opportunities. There’s a million things. I just don’t want to sell our team short. ... Nobody blinked. Everybody stayed in it and made plays, and I do love that about our team.”

Although the Trojans never trailed, they never got comfortable. Matt Barkley rushed for a score and passed for 202 yards with two TDs and two interceptions in another inconsistent freshman performance. Bradford’s breakout game included a 43-yard scoring run late in the third quarter.

“This was a different game than we hoped to have,” Carroll said. “We were scrambling, trying to slow them down. Our offense just carried us, which I love. You saw the way we ran out the clock?”

Ronald Johnson caught six passes for 99 yards, including a full-stretch dive for a 22-yard TD, in his second game back from a broken collarbone. Anthony McCoy had an early TD catch before spraining his ankle.

Jacquizz Rodgers, who had 186 yards and two scores last year against USC, talked trash to the Trojans defense from the opening snap, but sat out the second quarter with an injured right ankle. He briefly went to the locker room before returning to the sideline and starting the second half.

His older brother, James, had seven catches for 56 yards and a score while playing on a bruised knee.

“Both were a little banged up, but those guys give it all for the Beavers,” Canfield said. “We were really confident with what was in the game plan. In the second half, we really got it going and hit the things we liked on film.”

But James also was responsible for losing Oregon State’s first fumble of the season in the first quarter when Josh Pinkard alertly stripped him to set up the Trojans’ first score. The Beavers had won their last seven games after byes, but they haven’t won in Los Angeles since 1960.

Joe Halahuni had career highs of nine catches for 127 yards, and Justin Kahut kicked three first-half field goals for Oregon State, but also missed a 22-yard attempt.

“It’s a little disappointing, and there are some things we’re going to have to look at,” USC linebacker Chris Galippo said. “Really, it was just a bunch of little rinky-dink things.”

Stafon Johnson, the USC tailback whose throat was crushed in a weightlifting accident last month, made an emotional return to the Coliseum in the Trojans’ pregame meeting before watching the game from the press box. Johnson is recovering swiftly from the near-fatal injury, but isn’t expected to play again this season.

Johnson got a standing ovation when he appeared on the Coliseum scoreboard between the first two quarters.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) – Jimmy Clausen threw three incomplete passes into the end zone in the closing seconds as No. 6 Southern California held on for a 34-27 victory and its eighth straight win against No. 25 Notre Dame on Saturday.

Notre Dame’s streak of last-minute victories ended at three, but the Fighting Irish (4-2) at least showed they could compete with their longtime rivals this season.

USC had dominated Notre Dame and coach Charlie Weis the past three seasons and led 34-14 in the fourth quarter Saturday. The Fighting Irish seemed on their way to the type of lopsided loss that would have their supporters grumbling about Weis again.

Instead, Clausen and the Irish rallied back, but couldn’t score into the same end zone where the Trojans (5-1) famously scored four years ago on the Bush Push, which gave Reggie Bush, Matt Leinart and USC a 34-31 victory in Weis’ first season.

On Clausen’s first pass into the end zone, Kyle Rudolph made juggling catch but was out of bounds. The second was knocked down by Josh Pinkard and the Trojans started celebrating thinking the game was over.

Clausen and USC quarterback Matt Barkley, pals from southern California, even exchanged what they thought was a post-game handshake.

But the officials ruled there was 1 second left. Clausen fired to Duval Kamara, who slipped and couldn’t get a hand on it.

Barkley was 19 for 29 for 380 yards and two touchdowns to Damian Williams.

The Trojans appeared to be on the verge of blowing the game open when Joe McKnight dove in for a TD early in the fourth quarter.

But the Irish closed to 34-27 midway through the fourth quarter on a 2-yard TD run by Clausen and a 15-yard TD pass from Clausen to Golden Tate after an interception by Irish cornerback Gary Gray.

Clausen was 24-of-43 passes for 260 yards and two touchdown passes while facing a strong USC pass rush. He threw the ball away five times and was sacked five times. And in the end, he gave Notre Dame a chance, which is far more than the Irish have had in recent years against Pete Carroll’s mighty Trojans. In the previous three meetings, USC outscored Notre Dame 120-27.

Tate had eight catches for 117 yards. The Irish also got a 25-yard completion on a faked field goal attempt by holder Eric Maust that set up another touchdown.

The Irish were aided in their final drive by a couple of penalties by USC. Robby Parris caught a 13-yard pass on fourth down to the USC 16, but All-American Taylor Mays was called for a personal foul on the hit to Parris. That got the ball to the 8. Then Malik Jackson was called two plays later for roughing the passer, placing the ball on the 4.

But the Irish couldn’t get the game to overtime and USC celebrated its 10th straight win against a ranked opponent. The Irish lost their seventh straight to a top-10 team, matching the longest streak in school history set from 1984-1986.

Barkley wasn’t at his sharpest early, frequently keeping his receivers waiting for passes, in the first half. But after throwing an incomplete pass on his first attempt of the second half, he completed his next eight passes for 195 yards to help the Trojans take a 27-14 lead. That included a 41-yard TD pass to Damian Williams and a 60-yard pass to Anthony McCoy that set up a 3-yard Allen Bradford run.

In USC’s 38-3 victory in Los Angeles last November, the Irish didn’t get a first down until the final play of the third quarter and finished with 41 yards passing and 50 yards rushing. On Saturday, the Irish got a first down on their second play when receiver John Goodman ran for 13 yards out of the wildcat and had 72 yards passing and 49 yards rushing in the first half.

The Irish had five first downs in the first quarter, one more than they had the entire game last year.

BERKELEY, Calif. —With every punishing run, defensive stop or other big play in Southern California’s latest dominating victory, the Trojans sent a message back home to Stafon Johnson on his hospital bed.

“We were talking about him, before and after. He was a big motivator for us, and we might go see him later tonight, I’m not sure,” freshman quarterback Matt Barkley said. “Stafon knew we were on a mission tonight. I’m proud of our guys and how we played.”

Joe McKnight ran for 119 yards and two scores, Taylor Mays and the defense shut down Jahvid Best and No. 7 USC re-established itself as a national contender with a 30-3 victory over No. 24 California on Saturday night.

The win capped an emotional week for the Trojans (4-1, 2-1 Pac-10) that started with a frightening weight-room accident that sent Johnson to the emergency room with a crushed larynx and throat after a weight bar fell on his neck. With Johnson watching from his hospital room, his teammates delivered against Cal.

“Stafon is a leader and a big brother in the [locker] room, so I wanted to come out and win the game for him,” McKnight said. “We were thinking about him the whole time tonight, and we know he was liking what he saw back home.”

Damian Williams caught eight passes for 101 yards and also returned a punt 66 yards for a score, and Jordan Congdon kicked three field goals to give USC its second straight win following a 16-13 loss at Washington two weeks ago.

Mays set the tone with an interception on the first drive of the game for Cal (3-2, 0-2), and the defense kept it up all game, not allowing a point until the fourth quarter for the second straight week.

“That’s how we play,” Mays said. “We know what we have in the locker room, and we’ve been playing close to our potential for the last few weeks.”

With the defense playing this well, the Trojans are making it easy on freshman quarterback Matt Barkley. Barkley was inconsistent in this game, completing 20 of 35 passes for 283 yards and an interception. He moved the ball down the field with ease but struggled to punch the ball into the end zone.

“If our defense is playing like that, then we don’t need a whole lot of offense,” Barkley said. “I thought we executed well when we had to.”

The Trojans had the answer for whatever trick Cal coach Jeff Tedford tried. Best had five runs off direct snaps in Cal’s version of the wildcat and the Bears went for it twice on fourth down. But with a passing game that can’t click, there is no room to run for Best and no production for a Cal team that was held out of the end zone at home for the first time since 1998.

“We had a chance to make plays in the passing game and didn’t do a good job of it,” Tedford said. “We can’t be one-dimensional. We’re going to have to be able to throw the football to be successful. We were zero-dimensional today because we couldn’t run it and we couldn’t throw it.”

Even trick plays didn’t work. In the third quarter, Cal came out of a timeout with Shane Vereen standing next to its sideline, just on the field of play. With no defender near him, Vereen went out for a pass, but instead of a big play, Kevin Riley threw high for an incompletion. The next play was a screen pass that left tackle Mike Tepper caught for an illegal touch penalty.

That was the kind of day it was for Riley, who was 15 for 40 for 199 yards and an interception in his second straight sub-par performance. He was just 12 for 31 for 123 yards in last week’s 42-3 loss at Oregon.

Riley’s interception in the end zone on the opening drive was his first of the year. Six plays later, McKnight dived into the end zone at the end of his long run. Williams’ 66-yard punt return made it 17-0 in the second quarter and the rout was on. Williams caught eight passes for 101 yards.

After scoring 146 points in its first three games, Cal has just six the past two weeks. Cal has failed to score a touchdown just three times in eight years under Tedford, with two of them coming the past two weeks. The other was against USC in 2007, the last time Cal lost at home before Saturday.

“We have athletes all over the field. That’s the hardest part is how we’re not getting the ball in the end zone with everyone we have,” Riley said.

Even the speedy Best couldn’t get going against the Trojans. On one play in the first half, he was chased down by Mays for no gain on a third-and-2 run.

LOS ANGELES—The first time Matt Barkley wound up and really let loose with a throw, the Southern California freshman felt sharp pain in his bruised right shoulder.

Just not enough pain to stop him from leading the 12th-ranked Trojans to a bounce-back victory.

“When I had to gun it, I did,” Barkley said. “It hurt, but whatever. It’s football.”

Barkley threw two long touchdown passes in 9 seconds during the first quarter on the way to 247 yards passing, and USC rebounded from its latest upset loss with a 27-6 win over Washington State on Saturday night.

Joe McKnight and Stafon Johnson rushed for scores for the Trojans (3-1, 1-1 Pac-10), whose national title hopes were seriously dampened by last week’s 16-13 loss at Washington. USC’s offense still showed many of the problems exposed last week in Seattle, even with Barkley’s return from an injury that isn’t fully healed.

“I knew I was going to play through whatever pain there was,” Barkley said. “It felt good enough to get the job done. I felt a little limited in my arm strength, but I tried to gun it in when I needed to.”

The Trojans’ formidable defense had what coach Pete Carroll described as “an easy game.” USC made eight sacks, forced three turnovers in the second half and held the rebuilding Cougars (1-3, 0-2) scoreless until Dwight Tardy’s TD run with 22 seconds left.

Even the USC defense was paying attention to Barkley, who led the game-winning drive against Ohio State two weeks ago before missing last week’s loss.

“With a young quarterback in Matt, we’ve got to give him as many chances as we can,” linebacker Chris Galippo said. “When you’re shutting them out and putting all that pressure on the quarterback, we’re accomplishing a lot of our goals.”

Barkley was healthy enough in his third career start, going 13 for 22 with a handful of sharp downfield throws to Damian Williams, who had five catches for 100 yards, including a 57-yard score.

USC scored three touchdowns in the first 12 minutes, with Barkley throwing a 29-yard TD pass to Brice Butler and his throw to Williams on consecutive plays. Kicker Jacob Harfman adroitly recovered his own onside kick in between.

But in its seventh straight loss to USC, Washington State suffered nothing close to the embarrassment of last season’s 69-0 loss to the Trojans. The Cougars defense twice stopped the USC offense on fourth down near the goal line in the second half, preventing a blowout – and what’s more, USC racked up 13 penalties for 115 yards.

“It’s good to win, but we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Carroll said. “It was just not the satisfying kind of win that we like to have. We had so many situations where we made it so hard on ourselves.”

Freshman quarterback Jeff Tuel took over for Marshall Lobbestael in the second quarter and immediately led a 19-play drive for the Cougars, who dropped to 3-14 in coach Paul Wulff’s second season. Tuel got all but 5 of his 130 yards passing in the fourth quarter, when he led a 13-play scoring drive.

“It was an amazing experience, and it meant the world to me to have my teammates getting my back like they did,” Tuel said. “I’ll learn from everything tonight.”

USC’s trip to Berkeley next week lost much of its luster with No. 6 California’s loss at Oregon, but now the Trojans and Golden Bears will be playing to avoid near-elimination from the conference title race.

McKnight finished a three-play drive by scoring just 2:36 into the first quarter, in which USC outgained Washington State 195-13.

Early in USC’s third drive, Barkley threw a beautiful fade to Butler, his talented fellow freshman. Congdon then pooched his kick and fell on it before the Cougars knew what happened, and Barkley promptly hooked up with Williams over the middle for a rambling score.

Barkley even took a mean hit while releasing the ball, but pointed his hands skyward in excitement while flat on his back.

“We can play well sometimes, but we need to sustain it,” said All-American safety Taylor Mays, who also returned from injury. “We need to keep putting it on teams, and instead we struggled. Maybe we’re still getting better. We don’t want to peak yet. We want to keep getting better.”

Tuel, a Fresno high school product, nearly redshirted this season before the coaching staff became impressed with how quickly he picked up their offense. The mobile freshman replaced the 2-for-9 Lobbestael, who himself took over for Kevin Lopina last week, and immediately led the Cougars on a clock-consuming 58-yard drive over the final 8:35 of the first half.

But Nico Grasu missed a 34-yard field goal at the halftime whistle, visibly deflating the Cougars.

“It’s difficult, but that’s what a team is,” freshman defensive lineman Travis Long said. “If the offense struggles, the defense steps it up.”

USC has won 11 straight at the Coliseum.