USC Football: UCLA Bruins Starting Quarterback Revealed For Rivalry Week

Neither of Chip Kelly's preferred options played last week.

At last, your USC Trojans football team knows which quarterback will be lining up on the other side this week!

Unfortunately, head coach Lincoln Riley's program has about 15 minutes to prep, so hopefully interim co-defensive coordinators Shaun Nua, the defensive line coach under ex-defensive coordinator Alex Grinch, and Brian Odom, the club's linebackers coach, have already watched some game tape.

Pete Thamel of ESPN reports that junior quarterback Ethan Garbers, who sat out for an abysmal 17-7 defeat last Saturday to one of the worst teams in the Pac-12, the 3-7 Arizona State Sun Devils, will get the nod to lead Chip Kelly's offense for the UCLA Bruins' penultimate game of the 2023 regular season. Garbers and true freshman Dante Moore were both supposedly able to play in case of emergency for Kelly last week, but were both still recovering from ailments suffered the week before, in a 27-10 loss to Arizona. Third-string option quarterback Collin Schlee and fourth-stringer Chase Griffin, a law school student, handled all the snaps in the ASU loss.

Garbers could enjoy a big night, as the Trojans' terrible defense hasn't really improved much under Nua and Odom. The Bruins, conversely, boast one of the elite defenses in the league, which they'll certainly need against Caleb Williams, Zachariah Branch and the rest of USC's formidable offensive talents.

The Trojans enter the competition as -5.5 point favorites to win at home, per our favorite sportsbook aggregator The Action Network.

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