Woods Hits the Right Notes : College football: Wide-bodied USC tailback is becoming a favorite with bullish runs that to him are too good to be true.

On the wall of Jacqui Fifer’s home in Chandler, Ariz., in a single frame, are two photographs of her son.

“From Dream to Reality . . . “ says a caption over the pictures.

In the one on the left, a 2-year-old boy is wearing a USC cap and a USC T-shirt. In the one on the right, the little boy is grown up and wearing a USC football uniform.

Fifer’s son is LaVale Woods, 20, the wide-bodied, 5-foot-7, 200-pound tailback who has, after two years on the team, been given an opportunity to play for the school he’d set his sights on as a youngster.

Much has been made about USC All-American receiver Keyshawn Johnson growing up in the USC neighborhood, serving as a Trojan ball boy and helmet caddie for late 1970s USC teams, and licking stamps in the sports information office.

Woods never did any of that, but only because his neighborhood was in the Phoenix area. In terms of lifelong loyalty to USC, Woods won’t take a back seat to Johnson or any other player. “I think it was the song,” he said the other day, laughing.

“My first memories are of watching SC games on TV, and loving that fight song [“Fight On”]. I used to whistle it all the time. I even played it on the tuba.”

Woods was a tuba player in junior high at Mesa, Ariz., before he was a big-time high school football player.

Fifer says it’s still a mystery how her Arizona son was hooked so early on USC.

“No one in our family had any connection with SC,” she said. “It was just something that clicked with him when he’d hear that song on TV. He was so young, he didn’t even know what a university was.”

Woods, the onetime musician, is finally getting a chance to trigger the USC band with his touchdowns. He scored twice in the Trojans’ 26-16 victory at Cal last Saturday, just as he had the previous Saturday against Arizona State.

He’s the backup to starting tailback Delon Washington in USC’s ever-changing tailback sweepstakes. Only six weeks ago, running back coach Charles White told Woods that if he wanted to play at all this season, it would have to be as a backup fullback.

Then:

--Starter Leonard Green went down in the Arizona game because of a foot injury that still hasn’t healed.

--Shawn Walters was suspended Sept. 28, the result of alleged improper contact with an agent.

Enter redshirt sophomore Woods, whose squirming runs up the middle remind many of the 1960s Ram back, Dick (the Scooter) Bass.

Besides scoring twice in each of the last two games, he is averaging 6.7 yards a carry, the same as Washington.

Woods, by the way, wants his dimensions updated on the USC roster. He says he’s still growing.

“I’m now 5-7 3/4” he said.

But he can wait on that. He’s used to it. And even though his wait to play is over, he seems almost apologetic about it.

“I’m glad I have my opportunity, but I feel bad about the circumstances,” he said.

Of one thing Woods is certain--the identity of the starting tailback.

“Delon is the starter,” he said. “My function is to back him up, give him a breather now and then. All I want to do is help the team win.”

Most of Woods’ USC time has been heartbreak time. On two occasions, just as opportunity was at hand, fate nudged him out of the picture.

In the summer of 1993, he was in Coach John Robinson’s first class of recruits. The returning tailback starter was Dwight McFadden, but Woods’ explosive bursts up the middle that summer had him very much in the mix.

Then, in a scrimmage, he suffered the worst kind of ankle sprain--high, on the outside of his left leg. It cost him the entire season.

In 1994, bad luck continued. While practicing the long jump for the track team one day, he landed in the pit and felt a pop in his right knee.

It wasn’t believed to be a serious injury, and rest was prescribed. But when it didn’t heal, an X-ray revealed a bone chip.

He underwent arthroscopic surgery but missed spring practice and the knee hadn’t fully healed when last season began. He didn’t carry the ball until the fifth week of the season, against Oregon State.

All season, he had 15 carries.

This year, he had had only five until he had seven and nine against Arizona State and Cal, gaining 62 yards in each game.

“LaVale is a very powerful guy who’s very good at making a guy miss and go right by him,” Robinson said.

To USC running backs, Woods said, unity was to be the byword this season.

“Right from training camp, we all agreed on one thing--that we were going to be the best group of running backs in the nation,” he said.

“We wanted a situation where we’d all practice and play hard, where it wouldn’t matter much who was getting the most carries because whoever it was would be getting the job done.”