Entering his first season as head coach at USC, Steve Sarkisian is expected by most to stick with the incumbent, Cody Kessler, as his starting quarterback.
While that may ultimately be the case, Sarkisian is in no hurry to get there. Or tell anyone when he may end up getting there.
“When it feels right. I’m not putting a deadline on it,’’ the coach said of when he’ll go public with a quarterback decision. “When it feels right, when it looks right, I’ll probably let it sit one more practice, just to be sure, and then we will make a decision. Right now, we’re just gathering information and installing our stuff.”
In replacing four-year starter Matt Barkley in 2013, Kessler started every game for the Trojans as a redshirt sophomore, completing just over 65 percent of his passes for 20 touchdowns against just seven interceptions. With Max Wittek transferring out of the program in January, it left, essentially, Kessler and five-star 2013 signee Max Browne as the two prime contenders for the job in 2014. True freshman Jalen Greene, a three-star member of the Trojans’ most recent recruiting class, is an early enrollee and could play himself into the mix as well.
One week into spring practice, though, it’s apparent that the competition will likely come down to Wittek and Browne. Thus far, however, the media can’t seem to agree on which one may have the early edge based solely on practice reps.
“Kessler... took a strong plurality of the first-team snaps during the first week of spring practice,” the Orange County Register wrote, while the Los Angeles Times describes it as “Kessler and Browne appear[ing] to have received close to the same number of snaps during the first three spring workouts.”
It appears somewhat unlikely that Sarkisian will name a starter exiting the spring, although such a decision is certainly within the realm of possibility.
Then again, most Trojan fans could be looking ahead a bit and simply biding their time by waiting for the next big thing to come to Town anyway.