It was decided much earlier than that.
It was decided for USC on December 22, 2011.
USC not winning not being anywhere near the National Championship discussion was decided that day.
USC finishing outside the Polls was decided that day.
USC losing the Pac-12, and also the Pac-12 South Division was decided that day.
What happened that day?
Matt Barkley and USC held a press conference where he announced with a sneaky smile, he was returning for one more year because they had "unfinished business."
After that moment, USC was only doomed to fall hard and fall dramatically.
There's something that's not always talked about in sports and especially college football.
Humility has a place in sports and there is a power in possessing it.
It starts in who you recruit and how you recruit them. It's off the field, in the halls and rooms before teams ever take the field. Then it continues with game preparation and finally with how you play the game.
It's effects are seen in the number of penalties a team gets, in how they handle a loss, in how they handle their plans being disrupted.
Humility is about shutting your mouth and working. Never thinking you're better than any team, no matter a rivalry or a team like Western Carolina. Humility is putting your head down and working. It's never in any words you can ever say.
USC lost before the season ever started. With those two words and that sly smile, Barkley was continuing a tradition at USC that's been hounding them for decades; pride. That tradition used to exist at the likes of Notre Dame, Alabama, and every other school with a winning tradition. But this year, what's separating the teams with any sort of pride and the ones that are winning: a humility that comes from shutting your mouth and going to work. Where are Notre Dame and Alabama now?
Year in and year out, what wins? The talent that USC obviously has or the work ethic the likes of which Jim Mora has brought to Westwood? This year it was clear.
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