The Great Unranked Meet

You can throw out the rankings in these rivalry games.

Oops, looks as if somebody already did.

USC and Notre Dame meet as unranked teams for only the seventh time as they reunite today for the 71st edition of their storied intersectional rivalry.

Only this time, the story isn’t West meets Midwest, but which team is headed north and which one’s headed south.

USC buried its Rose Bowl hopes in the Arizona desert last week, but today’s game at Notre Dame Stadium stands alone.

“People say, ‘Well, the league is more important,’ and it is important,” USC Coach Paul Hackett said. “Hey, years from now, they ain’t going to ask you if you beat Arizona. They’re going to say, ‘Hey, did you beat Notre Dame?’ ”

Trying to recover from the Arizona loss against a resurgent Notre Dame team that started 1-3 but has gotten back to 3-3 with quarterback Jarious Jackson playing the best football of his career might seem like a little much.

But USC safety David Gibson said it’s actually a good turn of the schedule: Nobody should have any trouble getting up for Notre Dame.

“The thing about Notre Dame is it’s just a classic game, and it’s a rivalry, especially being back there,” Gibson said before leaving for South Bend. “A lot of the guys haven’t been there, and the guys that have are telling everyone what it’s like. It’s an incredible experience and a great thing to be a part of. That game brings enough anticipation and hype all by itself.

“This team has done a little bit of soul-searching this week. We’re 3-2. We think we should be 5-0, but things haven’t gone the way we wanted them to. It’s a real pivotal time. The team could easily go in the tank and kind of throw the season away. We can’t let that happen. That’s why the senior leadership wanted to step up and keep the team on the right track.”

Maybe the rest of the nation won’t be glued to the TV, but fans of the Trojans and the Fighting Irish will.

Anybody who cheers for Notre Dame is well aware of those three losses in a row after the Trojans ended a 13-game winless streak against the Irish in 1996.

“It’s a huge game for all the former players, all the coaches that have been a part of this game--and for us right now, after what’s happened the last three years,” Notre Dame Coach Bob Davie said.

“In ‘96, we went out there, Coach [Lou] Holtz’s last game, and we had a lot riding on that football game. We may have gone to the Fiesta Bowl that year if we won that football game.

“We lose that game in overtime--a devastating way to end the season.

“In ‘97, we played them at home. We weren’t a great team, but we certainly had an opportunity to win that game. I think back on a couple of things that happened late in that game that were frustrating.”

That was the last time USC and Notre Dame met as unranked teams, and John Robinson went out a winner in his last trip to South Bend as USC’s coach partly because of three missed field-goal attempts by Notre Dame kicker Jim Sanson--who was demoted to backup this week.

“Last year, we go out and get shut out in the Coliseum,” said Davie, whose team had to use two backup quarterbacks because Jackson was injured. “For us, they beat us three straight years. So you can see why it’s a big, big game for us.”

It’s just as big for USC, which would stay above .500 with a victory before heading back into the confounding Pacific 10 Conference fray.

“I think we’re ready to go,” quarterback Mike Van Raaphorst said. “I thought we were ready to go last week too. Hopefully we just go out there and play. Don’t analyze things too much. Just have a short memory. Not could’ve, should’ve done this on the last play or this play.”

USC should have run the ball better, to start with.

After flirting with a school record by rushing for minus-20 yards against Arizona, the Trojans are focused on trying to improve their running game.

But they’ll be doing it against a team much more accustomed to smash-mouth football than they are, and behind an offensive line that has been thinned--so to speak--by injuries.

USC usually counts on its defense, but that is less certain this week, since the Trojans face the unfamiliar and troublesome option element of Notre Dame’s offense.

USC probably needs to contain Jackson and the Notre Dame ground attack to have a chance.

Notre Dame has averaged 291 yards rushing in the team’s three victories, and only 111 in the three losses.

Jackson has 285 yards rushing when Notre Dame wins--and minus one when the Irish lose.

“Last year we didn’t play against Jarious Jackson, and he’s really the key to their offense,” Hackett said.

“This is obviously a huge game for USC. It always has been. It’s certainly two teams that wish they could be somewhere other than where they are, but I believe both teams could easily be undefeated. They weren’t that far away. And with a triple-overtime loss [to Oregon] and a seven-point loss at Arizona, we’re close. That’s history. They’re 3-3, we’re 3-2, and this is a big, big game. I know our guys will respond.”

Linebacker Markus Steele thinks so too.

“One thing about the USC football team, any kind of loss, we always come back,” Steele said.

Now would be the time, and the direction of the season could depend on it.

“If you can’t go to Notre Dame and play well, you can’t expect to be a contender,” Hackett said.

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USC at NOTRE DAME

11:30 a.m.

Channel 4

XTRA (690)

CALIFORNIA at UCLA

12:30 p.m.

Channel 7

KXTA (1150)