Carroll Puts USC on a Fast Track

The USC football team spent much of this summer only a few steps from the locker room, on the running track.

Coach Pete Carroll wanted speed and more speed, so his players worked for weeks on their sprinting technique. As tight end Alex Holmes said: “Everyone got much faster.”

With the start of training camp today, the Trojans need quick answers. Hoping to rebound from a 5-7 finish last season, they have only three weeks to hone a new offense and fill significant gaps on defense before their home opener against San Jose State.

“We have so much to do in such a short time,” Carroll said.

The biggest hole is at linebacker, where USC must replace the departed Zeke Moreno and Markus Steele. Aaron Graham emerged from spring workouts as the most likely man in the middle, but the outside spots were thrown wide open this week when safeties Frank Strong and Matt Grootegoed shifted forward.

“They make it more competitive for the guys who played there in the springtime,” Carroll said.

Again, it’s a matter of speed. If Strong and Grootegoed learn their new positions quickly, they give the defense two linebackers who can blitz off the corners and play man-to-man coverage.

The Trojans also need to settle on cornerbacks. The secondary was so vulnerable to long passes in 2000 that, in an early meeting after his arrival last winter, Carroll made his defensive backs take an oath: “I will never get beat deep.”

The good news: Kris Richard is recovered from an injury-racked season and Antuan Simmons is back, almost miraculously, from a life-threatening illness. But less-experienced players such as Chris Cash and Darrell Rideaux have yet to show they have matured.

The lineup on offense, the strength of this team, is not nearly as troublesome.

The most heated competition will be at the tackle spots where Eric Torres and Norm Katnik, atop the depth chart, will be pressed by Joe McGuire, Jacob Rogers and others.

The rest of the squad--including a host of veterans returning at the skill positions--will spend camp figuring out exactly how they fit into offensive coordinator Norm Chow’s new spread attack. Well, sort of new.

“There’s nothing unique about this offense that hasn’t been stolen from somewhere else,” Chow said.

Sultan McCullough, a pure runner who gained 1,000 yards last season, and Malaefou Mackenzie, adept at catching passes out of the backfield, probably will split time at tailback.

Quarterback Carson Palmer, honing his quick drop backs and even quicker passes from the shotgun, needs to play smarter after a turnover-filled season. Asked what he will focus on, Palmer said: “When you throw 18 interceptions, it’s not one thing.”

Chow sounded a little impatient.

“We’re not as far as we’d like to be,” he said. “We need to accelerate the learning.”

At the same time, Carroll expects a swift evaluation of his newcomers. That means Shaun Cody might get extra work at defensive end the first few days. And quarterback Matt Cassel, second on the depth chart, might give way to freshmen Billy Hart and Matt Leinart at first.

“We have to know early on, can they help us?” Carroll said.

Maybe the only thing the Trojans will take slowly is the competition at kicker.

The team struggled in this area last season, making only 10 of 18 field-goal attempts and failing on too many extra-point attempts, a number of which were blocked. Sophomore John Wall came on at midseason to make all five of his field-goal attempts but now must bounce back from a torn knee ligament that forced him to miss the last three games.

Senior David Newbury, inconsistent throughout his USC career, will try to win his spot back. The Trojans also have newcomers in walk-on Anthony Boscarini and David Davis, a second-team All-American at El Camino junior college last season.

“We’ll have a big competition through camp,” Carroll said. “We probably won’t decide until right before our first game.”