Emotional Issue for Trojans : USC: Rule against taunting shouldn’t dampen enthusiasm of players, crowd, Smith says.

Only a few minutes into ABC’s broadcast of the USC-Penn State game Saturday night, announcer Keith Jackson told a national audience that the worst fear of Penn State Coach Joe Paterno had been realized.

“The Trojans have come out with flames coming out of their ears,” Jackson said.

It was an arm-waving, head-butting, crowd-riling USC team that upset the Nittany Lions at the Coliseum, 21-10.

Clearly enjoying themselves, the Trojans whooped it up at every opportunity, eliciting a spirited response from a crowd of 64,758.

It’s a fine line between celebrating and taunting, especially in a season when these things are being watched more closely, but the Trojans didn’t cross it, Coach Larry Smith said Tuesday.

“If you want to show a display of emotion and enthusiasm, as long as it’s with your own crowd and players, that’s fine,” Smith said.

“What has happened is, everybody is so much on top of the taunting and all that kind of stuff that, in a way, they’ve taken some of the fun out of football.

“I’m not an advocate of taunting--don’t get me wrong--and I’m not an advocate of all that cutesy crap. I hate that stuff.

“But I think when you have a big play and show emotion with your own teammates, or if you try to get your fans going--I think that’s part of the game. . . .

“I think you’ve got to make sure you’re playing first and not being a cheerleader all day long, but that (show of emotions) doesn’t bother me a bit. I think it’s good. It helps add to the spirit of the game.”

Smith said the Trojans weren’t sure how to act during their opener two weeks ago, when they snoozed through a 24-10 upset by Memphis State.

“They all said they were a little afraid to show their emotions,” he said. “I told them, ‘It’s not too hard to (do).’ There’s nothing wrong with just getting excited and letting it come out naturally.”

He said their actions in the Penn State game were not contrived.

“It was not a phony thing,” he said. “It was natural.”

To be successful this season, Smith said, the Trojans must be emotionally charged.

“We’re young, we’re inexperienced and we’re not good enough to go out and play control football,” Smith said. “That’s why, on both offense and defense, we’ve got to go out and be very aggressive in what we do.

“When you’re blitzing a third or a fourth of the time, if you’re not really cranked up and coming, you’re going to get burned.”

But is it possible to play with such emotion week after week?

“If you don’t put limitations on yourself and try to work yourself into that (state of mind),” Smith said. “I look at tapes of Washington’s defense and it looks like they approach that level every week.”

Smith said that USC blitzed as well against Penn State as any team he has ever coached.

And, he added, expect more of the same.

“We had success with it and our players believe in it,” he said.

Penn State’s senior quarterback, Tony Sacca, was sacked five times, threw two interceptions and was not as accurate against the Trojans as he had been in the Nittany Lions’ first two games, misfiring on 22 of 40 passes.

USC’s personnel lends itself to a gambling style, Smith said.

“We’re not a big, physical, squeeze-down type of defense,” he said, noting that a converted linebacker, 225-pound David Webb, is now an undersized starter at defensive tackle. “We’re more of a quick, step-around, attack, go-after-them type (of defense).

“The other thing is, we’re able to play man-to-man coverage a little better (because of a more experienced secondary).”

Still, Smith said, the Trojans’ aggressive approach wasn’t as reckless as it might have seemed.

“We didn’t blitz (all out) as much as it looked,” he said. “There were times when we were bringing six and eight (pass rushers), but a lot of times, we were bringing only four and five. It was a matter of how they were doing it and where they were coming from. We got pressure on (Sacca) because we were bringing people from all different directions.”