Comment on Interim coach Helton leads USC into Pac-12 title game

By GREG BEACHAM, AP Sports Writer, San Antonio Express-News: World
Sun, 11/29/2015 - 8:52pm

Interim coach Helton leads USC into Pac-12 title game

The 24th-ranked Trojans (8-4, 5-3 Pac-12) beat archrival UCLA 40-21 to win the Pac-12 South title on Saturday, capping a seven-week surge under their interim head coach with their first victory in the crosstown showdown since 2011. USC advanced to the conference championship game against No. 7 Stanford and the chance to contend for a Rose Bowl berth — something that seemed highly improbable last month when athletic director Pat Haden fired Steve Sarkisian and promoted Helton to finish up a turbulent season for the second time in three years. Counting the Trojans' Las Vegas Bowl win under Helton two years ago, the interim coach is 6-2 at USC, with his only losses on the road to Notre Dame and Oregon. The Trojans have been largely solid under Helton, but it's still unclear whether they were impressive enough for the decision-makers at USC with sky-high expectations of annual contention for national championships. Fans and alumni still fill up message boards and radio shows with talk of bigger-name coaches from Chip Kelly and John Harbaugh to Kyle Whittingham and Tom Herman. Helton's supporters tout his character and stability after the tumultuous tenures of Lane Kiffin and Sarkisian — and they point to the example of unheralded Dabo Swinney, who shed his interim tag at Clemson in 2008 and eventually built the nation's No.

 

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