USC gets featured role on Saturday night series

ESPN announced that its ABC Saturday night college football series, which premiered last season, will return, and the schedule has USC making five appearances and UCLA one.

The Trojans’ game at Nebraska on Sept. 15 will be nationally televised at 5 p.m. PDT and the Trojans’ home game against Washington State the following Saturday will be regionally televised at 5 p.m.

UCLA’s home game against Notre Dame on Oct. 6 will be nationally televised at 5 p.m. USC’s other appearances on the series will be Sept. 29 at Washington, Nov. 3 against Oregon State and Nov. 10 at California. All those games will be played at 5 p.m. and one or more might be moved to ESPN or ESPN2.

The 12-week series begins Sept. 1 with Tennessee at California.

USC’s Thanksgiving Day game at Arizona State will be shown on ESPN at 5 p.m. PST. The USC-UCLA game at the Coliseum on Dec. 1 will be on ABC at 1:30 p.m. USC’s game at Notre Dame on Oct. 20 will be shown by NBC at 12:30 p.m. PDT.

UCLA’s game at Arizona on Nov. 3 will be shown by ABC at 12:30 p.m. PDT. The Bruins’ Sept. 15 game at Utah will be broadcast on Versus at 2 p.m. PDT.

-- Larry Stewart