Happy Ending for USC

Six months from now, Kareem Kelly has both feet in bounds.

Six months from now, USC does not jump offside so much its offensive line needs a leash law.

Six months from now, there is no red-zone confusion or red-faced misplays.

Time passes, and for USC, Saturday’s joint venture toward the depths of organized sport surfaces in the form of one letter.

It is a W.

The streak is over, and, for the team that ends it, the only other thing that matters is nothing.

USC beats UCLA, 17-7, and the memory of eight consecutive losses is flushed away with the flow of hundreds of students ignoring official warnings not to storm the Coliseum field.

One howling pack picks up Chad Morton and carries him over the same yard lines he just ran--30, 40, 50, 40--and with the same zigzag motion.

Morton is waving a sign that reads, “1 in a row, guaranteed.”

On the back of which is the blue symbol for handicapped parking.

“Coach Hackett told us to visualize what it would be like at the end of the game,” Morton says, “And that’s just about what it was like.”

Another group lines up to pound on David Gibson, hugging him and screaming at him until he waves his hand in front of his face to combat the smell of alcohol.

“You see that, you get into the realization of how much this game means to people,” Gibson says.

For nearly 30 minutes afterward the fans and players are as one, dancing and hugging and dropping to their knees to tear out little pieces of turf.

“Authority has no meaning over eight years,” linebacker Sultan Abdul-Malik says. “Three cops aren’t going to keep all those fans from the emotion of eight years.”

It is the first battle between losing USC and UCLA teams since 1941.

Not coincidentally, it is arguably the worst college football game of record since 1941.

But history books will have room only for things like, Paul Hackett can finally sleep.

“This is a monster,” Hackett says. “I don’t care what you do, you better win this game.”

So USC takes advantage of five UCLA turnovers and three failed trick plays and a rhythm as jerky as a 5 p.m. drive down the Harbor Freeway.

So USC uses a fingertip catch by Kareem Kelly for one touchdown, an illegal catch by Kelly for another touchdown, and a field-goal chip after moving the ball only three yards on three plays in the red zone.

So USC had only one fewer penalty (16) than passes completed by John Fox (17).

And their fans will say, so what?

The game is typified by Abdul-Malik’s stroll through an empty patch of field to the sideline after the Trojans had stopped the Bruins on fourth down with 5:10 remaining in the game.

His jersey is so tangled that only one of the two “fours” was showing. His pants are badly stained. Although he was trying to strut, it looks more like a limp.

Yet with his arms raised to the sky, it is the walk of a winner.

“In the end, who’s going to think about the turnovers and penalties?” Abdul-Malik says. “A win is a win.”

This is how this day is. This is how it always is. Sixty-nine times in 70 years. No matter if the teams are ranked or rank.

This is less a college football game than a family reunion softball game. It doesn’t matter if you fall on your face, run the wrong way, lose your pants.

You win the game, and you don’t have to hide.

Fox leaves the field talking not about touchdown passes or interceptions, but sweets.

“Now I can go to Westwood and eat my favorite chocolate chip cookies again without having to look around,” he says.

You win the game, and you can laugh at the replays.

“A touchdown is a touchdown,” Kelly says when told that TV showed that his first foot clearly touched the ground out of bounds on a leaping fourth-quarter touchdown catch. “We’ve had controversial calls all year. We’ve been beaten by controversial calls. So now we get one.”

He pauses, and shrugs.

“OK, fine, take the touchdown away. We still win by three.”

A game of scraping and stumbling and rummaging was a game of need.

USC needed this win more than UCLA. The Trojans tried to deny it during the week, but they knew they were only kidding themselves.

“There was a little pressure,” Hackett admits. “It was like, if you’re going to get them [UCLA], you should get them this year. This was a year they were vulnerable.”

And Hackett needed this win more than UCLA Coach Bob Toledo, particularly because their dueling snipes during the week started a little feud that Hackett is not yet popular enough to win.

Give classy Toledo credit for walking across the Coliseum field to shake Hackett’s hand with 15 seconds remaining on the clock.

Give Hackett credit for later admitting that he overreacted last year when he became angry when Toledo allowed Cade McNown to run a bootleg after a UCLA victory was already decided.

“I felt a little animosity a year ago,” Hackett says. “I came out of that game a little bit angry. Then I remembered. . . . This is a big deal. He just had more of his game face on than I did.”

Now that Hackett understands, it is hoped that both men understand this town doesn’t need any more fighting children.

Both men need to walk to the nearest blackboard in hopes of turning this game back into a show more befitting of this football-rich area, into a rivalry that looks a little less like New Mexico-New Mexico State.

Would it be too much to ask for a game with less than three penalties on one play?

“In a game like this, there’s a reason for all the false starts,” USC tackle Travis Claridge explains. “You just can’t wait to get up and knock somebody in the mouth.”

For the first time in nearly a decade, the Trojans knocked their way to victory. It was messy and muddled, but they’ve been without one long enough to understand it’s far too valuable to give back.

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at his e-mail address: bill.plaschke@latimes.com.