It was Lane Kiffin's debut as Southern California's head football coach, but quarterback Matt Barkley and the Trojans' prolific offense stole the show. The sophomore signal-caller passed for 257 yards and five touchdown passes on only 23 attempts in USC's 49-36 win over Hawaii in Honolulu. Senior wideout Ronald Johnson caught seven passes for 59 yards and three touchdowns. Not to be outdone by the passing attack, sophomore running back Marc Tyler ran wild on the Warriors, to the tune of 154 yards and a touchdown on 17 carries. Johnson had four total touchdowns, as he also returned a punt 89 yards for a score late in the first half.
An interesting quirk in Kiffin's game strategy was going for two-point conversions after touchdowns instead of simply kicking for one. The Trojans went for two after their first three touchdowns and kicked only three extra points out of seven total touchdowns.
The bad news for the Trojans, which was obviously good news for underdog Hawaii, was the offense was pretty high-throttle on both sides of the football. The Warriors racked up a whopping 588 yards of total offense, including 459 through the air. The Warriors receiving corps had their way with the USC secondary, as three receivers each had more than 100 yards receiving (Kealoha Pilares with 176, Greg Salas with 124 and Royce Pollard with 106).
USC will host Virginia next week at home, while Hawaii will square off with Army in West Point.




