Fox Ready for His Return

With his exile from the starting quarterback’s job over, John Fox said he is looking forward to playing Saturday at Oregon State after watching much of the last two games from the sideline.

“I’d be lying if I didn’t say it was hard,” said Fox, who watched Mike Van Raaphorst lay a solid claim to the job during the Stanford game before Van Raaphorst suffered an ankle injury that is expected to keep him out the rest of the season.

Fox said it was difficult to handle his frustration when he lost the starting job seven games into the season.

“You deal with it,” he said. “You don’t get past it. It really hurt and I think I made it too hard on myself. But what can you do? Obviously my performance was what led to the change.”

The ankle injury that has bothered Fox most of the season and affected his throwing mechanics has improved, but “it’s still not where I’d like it,” he said.

Van Raaphorst’s injury gives Fox another chance, with USC’s quarterbacking job the next two seasons probably at stake.

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The USC-UCLA game Nov. 22 at the 92,000-seat Coliseum is a sellout, marking the 15th time in the last 22 years the game has sold out. Kickoff will be at either 12:30 or 3:30. . . . USC practiced for about an hour Thursday in the Lyon Center because Howard Jones Field was wet.