IMHO Sunday: We’re underway, and thank you, Missouri State

In my humble opinion, cardinal and gold thoughts on what I see, what I hear, and what I think from Los Angeles.

Saturday’s resounding USC Trojans (1-0) 73-13 victory over the Missouri State Bears (0-1) in Troy’s 2025 home opener went about as expected over a 35-point MS underdog. However, let’s face it, Missouri State won’t get confused with Oregon, Michigan, Illinois, and Notre Dame. However, the unranked Trojans kept “fighting on” through four quarters on Saturday in LA and deserved the big victory.

We’ll see, however, if future Trojans’ opponents down the road don’t dramatically up the competition and really put SC head coach Lincoln Riley’s cardinal and gold to the test. It will be fun, interesting, and insightful to see how this 2025 season lands. But for now, the Men of Troy are 1-0 and that is a good beginning.

The Trojans’ defense still showed a vulnerability against the rush but got better through the first half. It’s not that the defense played badly, it just needs to tighten its gripe against offenses that will be far far far greater than the one they saw from Missouri State. As for the Trojans’ offense, they really got it rolling both in the air and on the ground. In fact, the the running game did have bright spots with both short and long distance blasts.

The Trojans offense against the Missouri State defense could be best described as progressively positive as 73 points would suggest. Although one of the scores for the Trojans came from a 36-yard pick-six by Bishop Fitzgerald. That score helped increase the Trojans to a 28-3 second quarter score.

Trojans quarterback Jayden Maiava, who will be one of the major deciding factors in the success of the USC offense and general team record, was 15 of 28 passes with two touchdowns. It was also nice in this rout of a game that freshman Husan Longstreet got action immediate action in the second half. He was 9 for 9 through the air and had 59 yards rushing. Speaking of rushing, Maiava had nine yards rushing with one rushing score.

For the record, the Trojans’ offense accounted for 597 total yards with Missouri State accounting for 224 yards. Troy had a whopping 233 yards rushing with 364 passing. Kudos to the Trojans’ new offensive line, which is still a work in progress. Trojans running backs Waymond Jordan, Eli Sanders, Bryan Jackson, and King Miller were exceptional.

Redshirt freshman kicker Ryan Sayeri had 11 kickoffs that resulted in nine touchbacks in addition to a 32-yard field goal.

Leading the Trojans’ defense in numbers on Saturday was redshirt freshman linebacker Elijah Newby with five tackles, followed by fellow linebacker Desman Stephens ll with four tackles. Junior DE Braylon Shelby and redshirt senior safety Bishop Fitzgerald also contributed with four tackles.

For the record, the Trojans defense did record five sacks. DE Braylan Shelby had two QB take-downs while DE Kameryn Fountain, DT Jide Abasiri, and S Kennedy Urlacher each had one sack.

Leading the 2025 Trojans out of the famous Coliseum tunnel before kickoff was former wide receiver great Drake London, now with the Atlanta Falcons.

The famed Trojans Marching band was in mid-season form, but I’d still like this wonderful group of musicians be seated behind and near the Trojans’ bench. At halftime, the TMB played songs from the 90s that included The Backstreet Boys.

Saturday’s Coliseum attendance was announced as 62,841. From our press box position high atop the Coli, that count could be about right as fans arrived late, yet they were vocal battling the heat.

The Coliseum’s west video board has been replaced with a new state-of-the-art LED display that features more than 5.3 million pixels and nearly 6,000 square feet of display space. Upgrades include sharper visuals, improved, reliability, and in-game features.

The pregame Coliseum press box meal consisted of BBQ chicken, rice, and a corn salad. As a nice gesture, after the game the USC brass provided pizza and refreshments after the post-game media conferences.

New Coliseum menu items for fans include mushroom torta, mac and cheese, hot honey chicken sandwiches and waffles, lobster rolls, and tri-tip hoagies.

Enhancing the Coli fire water spirit, there is now full access beyond beer and wine with a new Coors Beer Cave at Tunnel 15 and a self-serve draft “beer jets” at Tunnels 17 and 21.

For those fans on the go, there is the renovated Fight On Grill near Gate 19 for quicker service.

All 1,000 Lou Galen Club seats have been replaced for greater comfort, and Phase 11 of the Legacy Walkway is now complete with more than 400 new fan favers installed at Olympic Plaza below the Peristyle.

The 2025 Trojan Walk arrived on Saturday afternoon as the Trojan team arrived at the Coli two hours and 15 minutes prior to kickoff, so cardinal and gold fans could welcome Lincoln Riley’s team as they made their appearance at the Peristyle entrance.

The Coliseum’s famed lighting of the torch has been reenergized with the new video board to increase fan excitement. I found it to be impressive.

The popular Trojans Tailgate Show has been moved to the Peristyle this season. Fans now have the chance to watch the show live and meet the hosts. The show commences two hours before kickoff.

Troy is conducting Coliseum fan surveys after every home game this season, hoping the results will initiate improvements during the 2025 season and help in some long-term planning, as well.     

Up for the Trojans next Saturday afternoon (4:30 pm PT) in the Coliseum is the vaunted return of former SC head coach Clay “Gentleman” Helton. Helton is now in his fourth season at Georgia Southern. GS opened their 2025 season at Fresno State on Saturday night in 100 degree heat and came away with a tough 42-14 defeat.

For the record,Clay Helton is keeping his team in Cali for two weeks to avoid two back-to-back cross-country trips. FYI, last season Helton’s team finished 8-5. Gentleman Clay’s team plays their home games at Allen E. Paulsen Stadium, which seats 25,000. For the record, the Coliseum seats 77,500.  

A trio of former Trojans RB Woody Marks, S Calen Bullock, and CB Jaylin Smith made the roster of the Houston Texans.

Former Trojan making the NFL roster was DB Isaiah Pola-Mao for the Las Vegas Raiders. Good for Isaiah, whose USC career was up and down, probably found a real positive knowing his new Raiders head coach is former USC coaching legend Pete Carroll.   

Turning to the Trojans’ NFL world, final roster makers and those cut caught some eyes, both surprising and disappointing. It was great to see former SC wide receiver Taj Washington, after a tough season in the NFL due to injury for the Miami Dolphins, but it was disappointing to see that former Trojans receiver great Robert Woods was cut by the Pittsburgh Steelers. 

Big Ten non-conference weekend scores:

USC 73, Missouri State 13
Purdue 31, Ball State 0
Iowa 34, U Albany 7
Tulane 23, Northwestern 3
Maryland 39, Florida Atlantic 7
Ohio State 14, Texas 7
Indiana 27, Old Dominion 14
Penn State 46, Nevada 11
Oregon 59, Montana State 13
Michigan 34, New Mexico 17
Utah 43, at UCLA 10
Washington 38, Colorado State 21

Friday Big Ten non-conference results

Illinois 52, Western Illinois 3
Michigan State 23, Western Michigan 6

Thursday Big 10 non-conference resultsRutgers 34, Ohio 31
Minnesota 23, Buffalo 10
Wisconsin 17, Miami (OH) 0
Nebraska 20, Cincinnati 17

Notre Dame weekend score:
Sunday: Notre Dame at Miami (4:30 pm PT/ABC)

Big 10 Week 2

Friday, Sept. 5

NIU@Maryland
Western Illinois@Northwestern

Sat, Sept.6

Iowa@Iowa State
FIU@Penn State
Kennesaw State@Indiana
Illinois@Duke
Northwestern State@Minnesota
Grambling@Ohio State
Oklahoma State@Oregon
Miami (OH)@Rutgers
Middle Tenn.@Wisconsin
Georgia Southern@USC
Michigan@Okahoma
Southern Illinois@Purdue
Boston College@Michigan State
Akron@Nebraska
UCLA@UNLV
UC Davis@Washington

The Big Question: Does USC’s destruction of Missouri State get the Trojans into the Top 25 of the 2025 rankings?