Gibson a Combination Puncher

David Gibson is the big hit that USC almost missed.

Hard as it is to believe now, Gibson spent much of the first part of the season on the bench.

Lately, he has spent a lot of time forcing fumbles and recording sacks, emerging as one of the heavy hitters on the Trojan defense.

Even though he has started only four games, Gibson--a sophomore--leads USC in tackles for loss with 15 and in forced fumbles with five. His six sacks tie him with Chris Claiborne, trailing only Sultan Abdul-Malik with seven. Despite playing full time only half the season, Gibson has 51 tackles and ranks fifth on the team.

“I think it’s important to comment again on David Gibson and the job he’s doing,” Coach John Robinson said. “Each week, he seems to be one of the guys making plays, and we’ve got him in position to make plays. Antuan Simmons has done the same things. We have a sophomore and a freshman who I think are going to become major players.”

Gibson’s typical game since recovering the starting job at his hybrid safety-linebacker position has been something like nine tackles, three for losses, two sacks and a couple of forced fumbles.

“It’s been great,” said Gibson, from Santa Ana Mater Dei High. “There was a spell there I wasn’t getting the opportunity to play.

“I started the first game, then didn’t play the next two. It was a shock. I didn’t feel I had screwed up to lose the spot. It was a coaching decision that caught me off guard.”

Defensive coordinator Keith Burns was using Simmons at the safety-linebacker position because the Trojans were playing a string of passing teams, saying Gibson was better against the run and better in zone coverage than in man.

“It was a situation where we were playing man-to-man, and if you asked him to list his top qualities, he wouldn’t list man-to-man,” Burns said. “But he practiced hard every day and became a good blitzer.”

It wasn’t until safety Chad Morton hurt his hip in the Notre Dame game that the defense was reshuffled and Gibson got another chance.

He ran with it, finishing the Notre Dame game with 13 tackles, three for losses.

Simmons moved to strong safety, and Gibson became a starter again the next game--coincidentally helping clear the way for Morton to move to tailback.

Next season, with the departure of senior cornerback Brian Kelly and maybe junior Daylon McCutcheon as well, Simmons figures to move to cornerback. But Grant Pearsall, the starter at Gibson’s position who sat out this season because of knee surgery, will be back, and he and Gibson figure to cover the safety-linebacker and strong safety positions.

Gibson’s reemergence injected more size into what had been a munchkin lineup. He’s 6 feet 2 and 215 pounds, and he packs a punch.

“Some kids, when they play flag football, they knock a kid down and pick up the flag. He’s one of those guys,” Robinson said. “Other kids run around and try to pull the flag off.”

Gibson only shrugs.

“Hitting is just something that’s in you,” he said. “I just sacrifice my body. . . . I don’t have any fear of smacking a guy. It’s some knack I have.”

He’s confident of that again now. But a month ago, he was bewildered, and the thought of transferring entered his mind.

“Everyone would question their future at a school when you have your spot taken away,” Gibson said. “I was just thinking, ‘What would it be like at other schools?’

“My parents, . . . they are my big supporters. They said, ‘Keep your head up. That’s life. The best thing to do is keep plugging away and try to get better.’

“Some people say you should try to talk to the coaches and ask why you aren’t playing. But I wanted to play well enough that they would say, ‘He’s a good player.’ I wanted them to feel like I should be playing.”

When Gibson got his chance, he made it count.

“It wasn’t that it was right or wrong, it was that he got caught in a situation where we were playing a lot of man,” Burns said. “I always believe that when you give an opportunity to a player after he’s lost his position for whatever reason, he usually comes back even better.

“He’s done a great job. A fantastic job.”

Gibson is relieved it finally turned out that way.

“It’s the best football I’ve played,” said Gibson, who had 89 tackles as a senior at Mater Dei, which lost only two games during his high school career.

“I felt like I could play well at the college level, but you sit out and it kind of put things into perspective,” he said. “It puts a fire in you.”

That fire has made him a better player than many imagined he’d be, but Mater Dei Coach Bruce Rollinson says he had more than an inkling.

“Even when [Robinson] was recruiting him, I felt that David was going to be a late bloomer and continue to develop,” Rollinson said. “David’s one of those types of kids in our program who didn’t start to come on in size until his junior year.

“I don’t think he’s done growing, and he’s the type of kid who works as hard as anybody around him. He’s a very even-keel type of kid. He gets excited, yet he keeps it under control.”

Now that USC is keeping him on the field, everything is indeed under control.

NEXT FOR USC

Who: Oregon State

Where: Parker Stadium

Time: Saturday, 1 p.m.

TV: None

Radio: KLSX-FM (97.1)