Oregon-UCLA, USC-Arizona Highlight Vegas Pac 12 Predictions Week 7

Saturday Blitz Vegas Pac 12 Predictions Week 7

USC Trojans at No. 10 Arizona Wildcats

Line: USC by 3

Talk about disrespect. The Arizona Wildcats are undefeated, at home, and ranked in the top 10 but are underdogs against the unranked, 2-loss USC Trojans. That shows that people don’t believe this team is legitimate. Well, it’s time for them to prove it once again. Rich Rodriguez needs to use his balanced offense to torch a questionable USC defense this weekend. We know that Terris Jones-Grigsby, Nick Wilson, Cayleb Jones, and Anu Solomon at quarterback are playmakers. The question arising Saturday will be if the offensive line can do what it did to Oregon, and if the defensive line can frustrate USC. If both of those things happen, the Wildcats come out of Saturday with another huge victory, having earned even more respect. But if the defensive line struggles, the game turns into a toss-up. If the offensive line struggles, USC wins. Arizona needs to try to win the battle in the trenches again.

USC, meanwhile, needs to, well, for starters learn how to play defense. Doing that would probably help this team win this game. But to do that, the rush defense has to step up. Sure, the secondary gave up 510 passing yards last week, but the rush defense is what’s needed against Arizona, and they have already come up small this year (see Boston College). So stiffening up the defense is the first order of business if USC is going to win this game. The next order of business is for Cody Kessler, Javorius Allen, and the rest of the offense along with Steve Sarkisian to never take their foot off the pedal. If they get a lead, even a comfortable lead, keep firing because you never know when the defense could collapse or when this Arizona offense could simply get on a roll. If they keep attacking the Arizona defense, and their offensive line wins the battle up front, they’ll have a good shot at winning.

Prediction

Both offensive lines are going to manhandle the other team’s defensive line, and that’s going to turn this game into a shootout. USC and Arizona will go at it all night until the fourth quarter. But Arizona’s defense at least appears to have a better defense overall than USC, and they are playing at home. Those two factors will be enough for this team to pull out a close win and gain even more respect in the process. Arizona wins this late-night showdown in exciting fashion.

Arizona: 52 USC: 45