Trojans Consider It a Test : USC: After overlooking Memphis State last year, they know the challenge San Diego State presents.

In almost any other year, USC would be considered a lock to defeat San Diego State at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

This isn’t any other year.

Coming off its worst season since 1957, USC is a mystery, thought by many to be no better than the fifth-best team in the Pacific 10 Conference behind Washington, UCLA, Stanford and California.

“From 3-8 to . . . what? “ USC Coach Larry Smith was asked this week.

Said Smith: “I don’t know. We’re just trying to get to 1-0.”

It seemed to be more than coaching rhetoric when Smith suggested that today’s game against the Aztecs was of the utmost significance to the Trojans, whose confidence was shattered when they suffered through a school-record six-game losing streak at the end of last season.

“We need to get the feeling of winning a football game,” said Smith, who welcomed back 18 starters when training camp opened three weeks ago. “It’s really important for this football team to see some success. . . .

“If we lose it, I don’t think it’s going to bury us, but I don’t even want to think about that.”

San Diego State, opening its fourth season under Coach Al Luginbill, is coming off an 8-4-1 season that included a 28-17 defeat by Tulsa in the Freedom Bowl.

With a strong nucleus of returning players that includes running back Marshall Faulk, who led the nation in rushing and scoring as a freshman last season, the Aztecs have been picked by many to unseat Brigham Young as champion of the Western Athletic Conference.

And Luginbill, who took over a team that was 3-8 the year before his arrival and has guided the Aztecs to three consecutive winning seasons, is looking for a victory that would establish San Diego State as a top-25 program.

Winless in 15 games against UCLA since 1922, the Aztecs have never played USC, which last opened the season against an in-state opponent in 1945, when it defeated UCLA.

“It’s important that somewhere along the line we have a ‘hump game’ (and) . . . beat a nationally ranked program,” said Luginbill, whose team was a 30-28 loser against Miami two years ago. “We’ve certainly proven that we can play in the upper echelon of the Western Athletic Conference.”

Led by Faulk and quarterback David Lowery, who passed for 2,575 yards and was the Aztecs’ most valuable player as a sophomore in ‘91, San Diego State came within a point of winning the WAC championship last season.

Unlike Memphis State, which apparently sneaked into town without notice before upsetting the Trojans in last year’s opener, San Diego State has attracted the attention of Smith’s players.

“We just know more about them,” Smith said of the Aztecs, who were second in the WAC in total offense last season. “I don’t think we had a lot of respect for (Memphis State). We have a lot of respect for San Diego State.”

How the Trojans will feel about themselves remains to be seen.

USC opens the season with a new quarterback, sophomore Rob Johnson, a new attack-style defense almost identical in design to Washington’s and an aggressive, no-holds-barred approach.

“We are going to sell out,” Smith said. “We’re going to go after big plays on offense and big plays on defense and the kicking game. We want to establish the foundation of the kind of football team we want to be. We want to be a big-play team. We’re not going to sit back and be conservative the first game.

“What we want to do more than anything else is, hit the field the first play, pull the trigger and let her go. Don’t look back. Don’t look back at a mistake. Don’t look back on last season. Just go out there and let everything go.”

Trojan Notes

Five of USC’s projected starters--quarterback Rob Johnson, tailback Estrus Crayton, tight end Brandford Banta, nose guard Thomas Holland and defensive guard Shannon Jones--displaced returning starters to earn places on the No. 1 unit. . . . San Diego State averaged 478.3 yards a game last season. . . . USC is 2-3 in openers under Coach Larry Smith. . . . USC last played at San Diego on Oct. 13, 1945, losing to a team representing the San Diego Naval Training Center, 33-6.