Defense Has Reached Maturity at Right Time

Oscar Lua, USC’s starting middle linebacker, is a fourth-year junior from Indio. He talked to Times staff writer Peter Yoon on Friday about the Trojan defense and the injury problems it faced in addition to replacing some standout players from last season’s team.

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Our defense has taken some shots this year, but we are young. We have first-time starters in all aspects of the defense: On the line, the linebackers and in the secondary. It’s a challenge we’ve had to overcome all season.

There is a little bit of a West Coast syndrome in play. Teams do throw a lot over here on the West Coast so a lot of our yards have been given up through the air when we have big leads and people are trying to come back on us.

And we’ve been facing some pretty good offenses. Fresno State, UCLA, Notre Dame, Oregon -- those guys put up points on everybody, not just against us. (Note: USC has faced five of the top-11 scoring offenses in the nation. And Texas is No. 1.)

Early in the year we sustained a lot of injuries. The second game of the season we lost linebacker Dallas Sartz, one of our captains, for the season. In the first game, we lost safety Darnell Bing for one game. Cornerback Terrell Thomas went down for the season. On and off we’ve lost linebackers all over the place, including me, Thomas Williams and Keith Rivers.

Now the days have turned and everybody is back healthy except for the guys that we lost for the season, so I think our defense has finally settled up to where we feel comfortable. We’re not jumping around looking where to substitute, looking for guys to come in early in the game to rest the guys who are hurt.

A lot of guys left from last year -- Mike Patterson, Shaun Cody, Lofa Tatupu -- but I think we had more than enough guys capable of replacing them. Rivers replaced Matt Grootegoed really well. Keith is tied for fourth on the team in tackles. He’s fast, strong, and all he needs is a little bit more experience and he’ll be one of the best linebackers this university has ever seen.

Lofa is a magnificent player. No one ever would have thought that he’d be where he’s at right now [the Seattle Seahawks’ leading tackler with 104], but if you played with him you’d know what he’s all about. Me replacing him, I just try to do my best and hopefully fill some big shoes he left behind.

Cody and Patterson ... I mean, we’ve got a great replacement in Sedrick Ellis, a young guy who is great. He got All-Pacific 10 Conference honors this year and also LaJuan Ramsey.

The defense is absolutely solid. We’ve had a lot of growing to do in a lot of aspects, we continue to grow and it’s going to be one of the most dominant defenses in the Pac-10. We’ve met all the challenges we’ve been faced with so far this year and even though we haven’t faced an offense like Texas, I think we’re ready.