eleganttomcat
Junior
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2012
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Kn[]_[]ckles3o5;1278581 said:I don't know if any of you guys have ever been around the USC campus but the area is not nice.
Westside is real nice and that's where UCLA is.
When people think of Los Angeles they think of Westside which is Beverly Hills, Century City, Westwood and Santa Monica.
Takes some serious money to live out there.
USC is in South Central LA. Now contrary to popular belief South Central is not Overtown, Grand Avenue or Goulds.
Not even close.
I've been down to South Central many a time looking at fix n flip properties and it may not be Westside LA but it sure as ****
isn't Overtown. All in all the USC area is not someplace people dream of moving to.
Academic wise, USC is a rich kid's school similar in reputation to Miami. The top Academic schools in California are Stanford and the UC schools like Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD etc.
I can't imagine any kid who lives in a hood deciding his first choice in schools would be one right in the hood. Again, the USC area is not the palm tree lined streets of Rodeo or Bel Air. Nor is it the coastline of Santa Monica and Malibu.
To get to the nice area of Los Angeles you have to take the 10 through crap traffic so it could take you 20 minutes to over an hour depending on an accident, a traffic stop or just 5 million cars on the road all nut to butt going 5 miles an hour.
Also the Colosseum is not exactly a state of the art facility. It's kind of a stone Orange Bowl in it's last days.
Players commit to USC because of 2 reasons: the current success of the program, or they are from Cali and have had USC pounded into their senses for 18 years.
Last time I checked USC is in turmoil after a crappy season and Matthew Thomas is not a kid raised with Troy in his heart.
So let him come down here, and wonder why the **** anyone would want to live in the area, be the meat in a couple of white bread sandwiches, drive an hour west of the campus to get to the good area of LA and wonder why he didn't take a visit to Westwood and UCLA, then come back to Miami and check out The U in Coral Gables.
IMO he's a Cane. FSU is in disarray. USC has no chance, At Miami his family can see him play every home game, the team is seriously on the rise and he can be a big part of our future dominance or sit around Tally on that crappy campus and wonder why the **** he didn't listen to Duke, Deon, Tracey, Artie, Jamal and Denver tell him how good it felt laying the wood and 50 points on the FSU defense twice a year.
LOL. Let me emphasize I have no idea where this kid will go to school. I don't know the first thing about him. But if you guys think that simplistic viewpoint is an accurate appraisal of USC I'd love to see your reaction every time that school plucks another 5 star gem. Get accustomed to it. It will happen again and again, regardless of coach or current form.
USC has a tranquil classy compact campus that overflows with warmth and atmosphere as soon as you set foot. The camaraderie of the student body is unbelievable. That's what a recruit sees, or any prospective student sees. Within a minute or two you can walk from awesome Heritage Hall alongside the historic old physical education building around the corner toward the Tommy Trojan statue in front of Student Union. That's the heart of campus. Bovard Auditorium and Doheny Library flank each other next to Tommy Trojan. Great tree cover and brick walkways, with fountains and students lounging in the grass. The weather is almost always fantastic and the scenery guaranteed. I used to sit on nearby Von Kleinsmid Center steps and write my stories for the Daily Trojan while watching the world go by. If you needed to find anybody, in that era before cell phones, just sit right there. It was incredibly convenient to have such a small but elegant campus, with little parks everywhere. My parents were Miami alums but when they visited USC when I was a junior they were blown away. Like others they had bought into the notion that it was a crime filled area and that was the overriding concern. My dad sat on those VKC steps with me one afternoon and watched one friend after another approach, including many shapely coeds. He shook my hand and said, "Great choice." He sat in a couple of my classes and was impressed at the caliber of professors and the small class size. USC's academic reputation has risen steadily in the decades since.
Besides, the section leading from campus toward student housing, the University Village, and the Row on 28th Street is fine. That's where all the student traffic flows, not sideways toward the less desirable areas. Once you're on campus you don't think about an aerial view of a 5 mile radius. I have to laugh every time I read a depiction of USC, compared to what I experienced as a student. From what I understand, USC recently purchased the University Village property and will spend millions to expand and modernize it. The area is improving all the time, including the addition of the Galen Center, which is just across the previous boundary of campus, from my '80s era.
And any recruit who visits USC on game day will be treated to all the fantastic on-campus activities and aura. Beyond anything, that's what Miami lacks in comparison to USC and countless other programs. If you want to believe that's actually a college game day at Sun Life Stadium, be my guest. I'm more of a Canes fan than a USC fan, after growing up in Miami and attending the games when we weren't expected to compete for anything beyond an occasional minor bowl. The Orange Bowl was phenomenal but it wasn't until I arrived at USC that I realized what was missing when you lack an on-campus, or nearby, stadium. At USC the band and song girls gather on campus and perform near Tommy Trojan, before marching across the street to the Coliseum. There are gatherings all over campus for hours, with banners and activities. The walk across campus to the Coliseum is a boisterous happy time, with chants and feigned mooing, since it's like a procession of cows. You pass tailgaters, many of whom join the march. During my Las Vegas decades I can't count how many times I accidentally met old friends from USC on campus game day and we ended up watching the game together, then visiting Tommy's on Beverly and Rampart for chili burgers and reminiscing. Miami has 5 titles but nothing like that.
USC football recruiting is a long practiced skill. The guy who runs the sports information department, Tim Tessalone, has been there for more than 30 years. He was a high profile assistant in that department when I was in school. I remember visiting that office in Heritage Hall while researching my stories, and watching Tim coordinate the recruiting visits...who was going to accompany the recruit and what the itinerary and time table were. Then at the scheduled point Marcus Allen would show up and off they'd go with the recruit, the first visit downstairs in front of the Heisman Trophies, with the recruit's mouth ajar. At that point the song girls worked out only yards away, in front of the Heritage steps, in little warmup outfits so they could see their reflection in the windows of Heritage. After 30 years I can only imagine how much more sophisticated the recruiting practice has become. I'm probably one of the very few Canes fans who never has to wonder how USC snags a recruit, and I'm certainly not surprised. Fight On indeed.
This ****made my head hurt. Stopped reading after the first paragraph. This looks like some crap out of a USC brochure. Where did you copy and paste this from?
Shouldn't you be recruiting 6 instead of posting this?
If U$C is so great why did you have to buy Reggie a house for him to play there?
because alabama and auburn each only offered him a boat. reggie preferred the house.
