Their Rivalry Goes Beyond UCLA vs. USC : College Football: Quarterbacks Bret Johnson of the Bruins and Todd Marinovich of the Trojans have been matching skills since they were youths.

Either you’re for Todd Marinovich. Or, you’re for Bret Johnson.

No middle ground.

Never was when they were kids.

Or in high school.

Or on the recruiting trail.

And there certainly won’t be any Saturday at the Coliseum.

Opposing quarterbacks in Saturday’s USC-UCLA game, Marinovich and Johnson have been pitted against one another most of their lives. Al Davis and Pete Rozelle haven’t bumped heads as often.

Some say reporters have blown up the Marinovich-Johnson relationship into a feud. Others blame the players’ fathers, Marv Marinovich and Bob Johnson, claiming the rivalry was an extension of their feelings.

But there’s no disputing that, at every turn, each has found the other in his path.

When Marinovich was the quarterback at Capistrano Valley High in Mission Viejo, Johnson was the quarterback at El Toro High, three miles away.

In those days, fans of Capistrano Valley were automatically expected to hate Johnson. And vice versa for El Toro fans.

Marinovich and Johnson were opposing guards on their prep basketball teams.

When it came time to choose colleges, both were recruited by USC.

But Marinovich, who will admit there is “a little tension” between the pair, says the whole thing seems to come down to the height factor.

Marinovich is 6-foot-4. Johnson is 6-0. Reporters tell of several times when Johnson didn’t want to pose next to Marinovich for photos because of the disparity.

For a Times photo, Johnson once was asked to face the camera with Marinovich beside him, leaning on his shoulder.

“No way,” said Johnson, walking away.

Recalled Marinovich: “I remember one time we met at a neutral site for some pictures. Now normally, Bret would come up to here on me,” he said, pointing under his chin. “But this time, he was looking at me eye to eye. I knew something was wrong.

“He was wearing high-top shoes and I know he had something stuffed into them because you could see his ankles coming out of the top of the shoes.”

But how can Marinovich be sure Johnson had used something to make himself look taller?

“When he drove up for the pictures, he was wearing his (football) shoes,” Marinovich said. “Not too many people drive with cleats on.”

Johnson, advised of Marinovich’s recollection, denied that the incident ever had happened but did not elaborate.

Johnson stood tall on the football field, though, when the two were in high school. The first time they met, Johnson’s team came away the winner, 17-14.

A year later, Capistrano Valley won, 22-21, but was eventually forced to forfeit when it was revealed that Capistrano Valley Coach Dick Enright had viewed a videotape of El Toro’s practice, a violation of Southern Section rules.

Enright resigned after the incident, but Marinovich defends him to this day.

“It was a joke,” Marinovich said. “It was the most ridiculous thing. People in the CIF think they are in the NCAA. The coach watched five minutes of a tape shot into the sun from 200 yards away in a camper through a fence.

“The players had no idea of anything (El Toro players) were going to do. We never saw the tape.”

Whereas Marinovich never won a high school playoff game, Johnson did not lose a game he started in his last two seasons at El Toro. In both of those years, El Toro won a Southern Section title.

Bret played for his father, Bob. Todd’s father, Marv, although never his coach, helped train Todd since he was a toddler. Neither Marv, a former Trojan and pro football player, nor Bob was shy about extolling the virtues of his son, adding further heat to the rivalry.

In basketball, it was just as intense. Capistrano Valley, with Marinovich as a shooting guard, won the league title both seasons he and Johnson, more of a ballhandling guard, went head to head.

“We owned them in basketball,” Marinovich said. “That’s one thing I have over him.”

In the football recruiting battle, both kids, among the most highly sought in the country, were called by the Trojans.

Johnson said: “When I visited USC, (Coach) Larry Smith told me that he was talking to me and Todd and two others and whichever one committed first was the one he would go with.”

A USC official tells another story, claiming that Smith told Johnson that, regardless of his decision, Marinovich would have the inside track for a starting job.

“We recruited both of them equally as hard,” Smith said. “The things Bret does probably fit our offense more. We felt that Todd had never been asked to do the kind of stuff we were doing. But he could do it. So, it was a toss-up.

“Todd was more of an in-the-pocket type of guy, where Bret threw more play-action, sprint-out type of stuff.”

As it turned out, the rivalry remained intact, just moving north a little. But the paths the two have taken have proven highly divergent.

Johnson has battled Jim Bonds all season for the starting job while struggling as part of UCLA’s worst team in nearly two decades.

Marinovich’s well chronicled season has gone just the opposite. Penciled in as the backup to Pat O’Hara in training camp, Marinovich was handed the job when O’Hara went down with a season-ending knee injury just 10 days before the opener.

And he hasn’t looked back since, leading USC to an 8-2 record and a third consecutive Rose Bowl berth with a season that has already placed him high among the school’s career passing leaders.

Once, the two were actually on the same side. That was way back in the sixth grade, when Marinovich briefly joined Johnson’s youth basketball team.

Johnson said he never really got to know Marinovich then because Todd left the team just a couple of weeks later.

Johnson might have figured then he would never see Marinovich again.

If he did, how wrong he was.

Trojan Notes

Trojan linebacker Scott Ross is definitely out of Saturday’s game. Ross sprained a knee ligament last week against Arizona, may be sidelined three to six weeks, leaving his status for the Rose Bowl up in the air. . . . Fewer than 700 tickets remain for Saturday’s game.