Know Your Enemy, Pac-10 Edition: USC Trojans

Black people love Mayo.

O.J. Mayo, that is! And so does the rest of the country – with Mayo in the fold, USC will be traveling to a number of different neutral-site tournaments and testing themselves against some solid teams, including Kansas, Memphis, and Oklahoma. It’s a far cry from the cupcake schedule last year.

USC made it to the Sweet Sixteen last season. The biggest factor in that run? Tim Floyd. For so many years Trojan hopes were dashed by Henry Bibby – I remember from college that he was widely regarded as the worst coach in the Pac-10. Floyd, however, can eat two footlongs from Subway.

Oops! Wrong Floyd.

Tim Floyd, you’ll remember, managed to get guys like Marcus Fizer and Jamaal Tinsley to Iowa State, so you can imagine what he’s been able to do in Los Angeles. USC’s facilities are the worst in the Pac-10, but it doesn’t seem to matter because athletes fall all over themselves to go there. Why? Because Los Angeles is filled with rappers!

Case in point: My good friend Brianna Martinez reports that Lil’ Romeo will be suiting up for the Trojans. Floyd is reportedly really excited about having Master P, Silkk the Shocker, and C-Murder around the program. How could that be a bad idea?

Right now, Romeo (as he’s now called) is working on his latest album, Gumbo Station. According to his MySpace page it’s going to be his best album yet.

In other news, our good friend Lod Stewart wasn’t allowed into practice until he wrung all the water out of his system. So he went all Louden Swain to cut the weight and now Coach is going to let him wrestle Shute.

At the end of the day, having Tim Floyd will make all the difference for the Trojans. Without him, I’d peg them for another year of underachievement. With him, I think they’ll challenge for the Pac-10 Championship. The talent is there – it always is – but having a coach down there to keep the players focused on basketball and keeping them prepared will mean the world to them.

This just in!!! USC has given up 96 points and lost to tiny Mercer of Macon, Georgia despite 32 servings of Mayonnaise. This leads me to believe that the earlier paragraph is moot. Despite having O.J. in the cut, USC will be terrible again.