UCLA v. USC: The Coming Armageddon

If you follow college football, especially if you do not live on the East Coast, you know that USC has continued undefeated this year in its march toward a third consecutive national championship. You may also have heard that UCLA, thanks to four incredible fourth quarter comebacks, is also undefeated, one of five such teams remaining in Division 1-A. Thus, it is possible that the two Los Angeles gridiron powerhouses could meet at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on December 3 with pristine records. USC will be looking to retain its inside track to the BCS national title game, held this year at the Rose Bowl, the Granddaddy of the Bowls and UCLA’s home field, while UCLA will be attempting to knock USC out of the title game and, perhaps, put themselves in it (although UCLA has been the lowest-ranked of the undefeated teams all season).

Even discussing this could be the final jinx on their seasons, but supposing they get that far, an interesting question arises. In the long history of their intra-city battles, have these two teams ever met under similar circumstances, and if so, what happened?

Only once in their history, which dates back to a first contest in 1929, have both UCLA and USC entered the game against each other undefeated and untied. In 1952, USC spoiled UCLA’s perfect season, winning 14-12. USC lost the next week to Notre Dame, 9-0, but ended up the Pacific Coast Conference champion, went on to beat Wisconsin 7-0 in the Rose Bowl, and ended the season ranked 5th in the nation by AP. UCLA would finish the year ranked 6th in the country by both AP and UPI.

UCLA and USC also met when they were both undefeated but with one tie in each of their records. On that occasion in 1969, USC again ended UCLA’s undefeated run … with another 14-12 victory. As the Pac-8 champion, USC then defeated Michigan in the Rose Bowl to conclude a 10-0-1 year with a final ranking of 3rd by AP. UCLA finished the season ranked 10th by UPI and 13th by AP.

Early in their history, UCLA and USC would typically meet at the beginning of their respective seasons, rather than at the end as they do now. As a result, there were several other games in which both teams were technically undefeated and untied, although neither team had yet played a game in those seasons. For the record, in those games USC beat UCLA four times and the teams tied once. In their first two meetings, opening the 1929 and 1930 seasons, USC trounced UCLA by scores of 76-0 and 52-0 (the teams would not play again until 1936, when UCLA managed to battle the Trojans to a 7-7 draw). USC opened its 1943 and 1945 seasons with 20-0 and 13-6 wins over UCLA. Only in 1944 did UCLA manage a 13-13 tie in its season-opening tilt with USC.

Unlike most blather that appears on blogs, mine included, what follows here is the result of my own independent research. Should both teams survive the next month’s worth of games to arrive at the December 3rd contest undefeated, I will have saved some stathead at ESPN.com some work. And don’t think I won’t be looking for some SportCenter anchor to spout exactly these stats, complete with grainy footage of the 1952 game.

As a UCLA alumnus, I must also point out that while the Men of Troy have a much longer and more heralded legacy in football, UCLA is the most successful intercollegiate athletics institution, with 95 total NCAA titles coming into the 2005-2006 year, while USC is third with 83 titles. Lest that make you think that UCLA is nothing but a jock school, let me provide a few more pertinent data points, courtesy of the 2005 US News and World Report Rankings:

Undergraduate rank: UCLA 26th, USC 30th.
Business school rank: UCLA 11th, USC 26th.
Law school rank: UCLA 15th, USC 18th.
Medical school rank: UCLA 11th, USC 32nd.

Fight on, indeed.