BLOOMINGTON — Grant Wilson waved to the Indiana crowd and pumped his fist. He embraced athletic director Scott Dolson and university president Pam Whitten as he made his way to the locker room.
The seventh-year quarterback had earned his first win as a Hoosier just minutes before, in a 27-13 win over USC, and there was very little that the Trojans could do about it.
“He did a good job,” Trojans defensive tackle Alex VanSumeren told reporters. “At the end of the day, they won. Nothing we weren’t prepared for by the coaches. They had a great game plan for us. We had great preparation. Just a few plays we need back.”
Curt Cignetti declined to name a starting quarterback all week, saying only that he would go with “who we trust out there” between his choices of Wilson and Josh Hoover, who was Indiana’s original starter this season.
Wilson’s first pass of the game was incomplete, but he followed up with a deep, 47-yard pass to Shazz Preston in his next attempt. He ended the drive with a 13-yard touchdown pass to tight end Brock Schott.
He completed 17 of 27 passes for 305 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. Nick Marsh was his top target, catching four passes for 80 yards.
The Trojans’ defense showed glimmers of its potential to shut down Wilson and the passing attack, like when defensive tackle Jide Abasiri sacked him for a loss of 9 yards or when Deven Bryant intercepted him for his first career pick.
There were even more missed opportunities.
Another potential interception bounced out of Bryant’s hands in the end zone, and cornerback Jontez Williams got close enough to snag an interception for himself, as well. Abasiri was close to sacking Wilson on a separate occasion, but the quarterback held on long enough to fire a touchdown pass to Schott.
“We probably dropped four interceptions — three like, no-doubters,” head coach Lincoln Riley told reporters. “It’s too many missed opportunities to beat a really good football team on the road, and those will be some of the ones that we’ll be sick about when we watch it.”
Travel interferences
USC reached Bloomington with very little interference from the nationwide FAA ground stop that had halted all flights for over four hours on Friday afternoon. Information is still rolling out, but charter flights like the Trojans use should be minimally affected by the delays and cancellations that are affecting commercial flights.
Only one FBS football game was moved to Sunday: Ole Miss at Oklahoma, which will kick off at 1 p.m.
Other Saturday games that were delayed included Auburn at Mississippi State and Utah at Arizona. All Big Ten games are scheduled to kick off as usual.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was asked about college football transportation during a White House briefing on Friday night, shortly after the ground stop was lifted:
“We’re going to allow for general aviation and those larger movements to take place as a priority. Smaller movements will take a lower priority. And so if you talk about football teams moving, many of those are on charters and there’s a lot of individuals on those charter planes.”
Cold kickoff
Saturday marked the coldest kickoff that the Trojans have experienced this season, with Bloomington’s cold snap dropping temperatures to 46 degrees at kickoff.
Although no snow is expected in the forecast, USC is 0-2 in the snow games it played in 1955 and 1957. The Trojans are, however, 7-6-1 in cold weather games based on available information from 1935 to 2010.
Cold weather games, according to the information, are defined by any game recap that made a reference to cold conditions.
The Trojans did not appear to be fazed by the chilly air during the pregame stretch, and many of them came out wearing their usual warm-up outfits of T-shirts and football pants.
“It’s all mental,” cornerback Jontez Williams said. “If you say you’re cold, you’re probably gonna be cold. If you go out there and like, ‘man, that’s nothing to me,’ then you’re gonna be all right, gonna be fine out there for sure.
“And there’s heated benches, as well,” he added with a laugh.