Illinois Has Points to Make Against USC

Coach Mike White discounts the notion that his Illinois football team will be on a crusade when it plays USC today at Memorial Stadium in the season opener for both clubs.

But all the elements of a crusade are there for the Illini. Consider:

--Illinois, a substantial favorite, was embarrassed by UCLA in the 1984 Rose Bowl game, 45-9.

--The Pacific 10 has won 10 of the last 11 games from the Big Ten in the New Year’s Day game, suggesting that one conference just may be better than the other.

--Illinois couldn’t beat a Stanford team that was mediocre, at best, last season in Palo Alto, losing, 34-19.

--There are 24 California players on the Illinois roster, 15 on the two-deep lineup. Some of them, including All-American wide receiver David Williams, feel slighted that USC and UCLA didn’t even try to recruit them.

--White, a former California coach and offensive coordinator at Stanford, said that when he was at those schools, USC was the standard by which they judged their programs.

“When I was at Stanford under John Ralston, we felt that the only way we could be successful was to beat USC,” White said. “We had to do it. It hurt us early on when we were losing. But we changed our entire offensive philosophy.

“We had the same barometer when I was at Berkeley. We had a certain amount of success, but there was no formula to it. We had to get over the awe and almost the fear we had for the Trojans. We got over it to the extent that we were at least competitive.”

In White’s last two seasons at Stanford, 1970 and 1971, the Cardinal had Rose Bowl-winning teams, beating USC in the process. He tormented the Trojans when he was at Cal, beating them twice and tying them once in his six seasons at the school. Cal hasn’t beaten USC since White left after the 1977 season.

Now in his sixth season at Illinois, with the background of four straight winning seasons, White prepares to take on USC with, perhaps, his best team. He has a potential No. 1 NFL draft choice in quarterback Jack Trudeau, who has completed 64.1% of his passes, 36 for touchdowns.

Williams, from Gardena Serra High and Harbor College, caught 101 passes last year, the second-highest total in NCAA history. He is also a potential first-round draft choice.

Fullback Thomas Rooks gives the Illini running balance. He gained 1,056 yards last season. It marked the first time in Big Ten history that a team had a 1,000-yard rusher and a 1,000-yard receiver, Williams, in the same season.

Illinois also has an All-American guard prospect in Jim Juriga, and two outstanding defensive players in safety Craig Swoope and tackle Guy Teafatiller from Cerritos College.

Six of the front seven defensive players returned this season but, with the exception of Swoope, the secondary is inexperienced.

Chris White, the coach’s son, also supplies offense. He kicked a Big Ten-record 24 field goals in 1984.

Illinois is characterized as a finesse team with its prolific passing game. USC is regarded as more of a power team with its big offensive line and pounding running game.

But USC Coach Ted Tollner says his team can’t be one dimensional and expect to win, and that neither can Illinois.

It would seem that USC, a four-point underdog, must find a way to keep Illinois’ offense off the field. Time-consuming drives would seem to be the surest way.

Tollner said that Williams doesn’t go deep very often in Illinois’ ball-control passing scheme. “He lines up in the slot and runs crossing or return routes,” Tollner said. “He’ll catch a five-yard pass and then just take off with the ball. As for Trudeau, he rolls to either side and always seems to know where Williams is.”

Illinois will be attacking an unproven area of USC’s defense, new starters at cornerback and outside linebacker.

Tollner said that Illinois does a lot of blitzing on defense, leaving its cornerbacks in man-to-man coverage.

This means that USC’s Sean Salisbury, not a particularly mobile quarterback in the past, must avoid the blitz and take advantage of single coverage on his receivers.

There is a possibility that today’s game, which will attract a sellout crowd of 76,000, could be a preview of the Rose Bowl game.

USC and Washington are generally regarded as the favored teams in the Pacific 10, and Illinois is expected to fight it out with Ohio State and Iowa for the Big Ten title.

White said he’ll know more about his team in a few weeks. Illinois encounters USC and Nebraska in two of its first three games.

If White does get Illinois to the Rose Bowl, he said, he won’t make the same mistake he made in 1983.

“We did things 48 hours before the game that we wouldn’t do 48 hours before an Ohio State or Michigan game,” he said. “We had so many kids from California and they had so many obligations. I just didn’t keep them in the right frame of mind.

“We were thoroughly beaten by UCLA and we may have lost anyway, but I take the responsibility for changing our procedure.”

Trojan Notes Kickoff for today’s game is 11 a.m., PDT. Neither school can appear on live television this season, the last sanction of NCAA probation. . . . The game will be broadcast by KNX radio, with taped-delay television coverage scheduled Sunday on Channel 2 at 4 p.m. . . . The weather is expected to be hot and humid--90-degree temperature and 60% humidity. . . . The teams will be playing on a new synthetic field, AstroTurf-8, made by Monsanto. Ted Tollner said that his team has the option of wearing turf or tennis shoes on the new surface. . . . Inside linebacker Rex Moore and offensive tackle Gaylord Kuammo won’t play today because of injuries. Offensive tackle James FitzPatrick was held out of practice this week with a hamstring injury but is expected to play.

USC will go into the game ranked fifth and sixth nationally in the UPI and AP polls. Illinois is 10th and 11th, respectively. . . . Illinois beat USC, 19-0, in the first meeting between the schools in 1935. But USC has won seven straight since, including a 55-20 rout in the last meeting in 1972. USC went on to win the national championship that year. . . . USC has lost only once in its last 23 games with Big Ten teams, that loss a 42-21 setback to Ohio State in the 1974 Rose Bowl. . . . Illinois defensive end Curtis Clarke is the son of Leon Clarke, a former end with USC and the Rams.