Enemy Lines
The difference between the USC and UCLA football programs is working late.
It's Monday night, a chilly wind blows across the wet grass, his team has left the practice field, yet he does not.
He is tutoring a player. One player. He stalks around him, shouts at him, laughs with him, pushes him, again and again.
The difference between the USC and UCLA football programs is a three-time Super Bowl champion, a former Pro Bowl linebacker, one of the winningest players in pro football history.
He played for UCLA
Yet he now coaches at USC.
Because UCLA wouldn't hire him.
And USC couldn't wait to hire him.
His name is Ken Norton Jr., and not even an all-day whipping on Saturday would hurt some Bruin fans as much as the sight of him standing on the Rose Bowl sideline wearing cardinal and gold.
"I've already seen it on TV," said former Bruin Mike Sherrard, "and it's hard to stomach."
While Norton has the modest title and duties of a graduate-assistant linebacker coach, this week he is a metaphor as giant as some of the hits he landed in his 13 pro seasons.
What folks have been saying forever, Norton shouts without saying a word.
You are Bruin for four years, but you are a Trojan for life.
Even with former player and current Coach Karl Dorrell promising change, the Bruins are slow to embrace the bright parts of their football legacy, while the Trojans squeeze every ounce out of theirs.
Bruin success is often fleeting and forgotten, as if it were a mistake, while Trojan success is expected and enriched.
Can you imagine USC -- where one bumps into former players in every corner of campus -- allowing someone like Norton to walk to the other side of town?
Can you believe UCLA did just that?
"Now I really understand how impressive it is over here," Norton said after Monday's practice. "They know how people should be treated."
The last time I spoke to Norton was two winters ago, at the news conference announcing the hiring of Dorrell.
Norton stood proudly in the UCLA Hall of Fame room, shaking hands, giving interviews, giddy at the prospect of the program's returning to its roots.
When I spoke to him Monday, he wore a USC cap and USC sweats and a look of wonder.
The story is that after Dorrell was hired, Norton offered his services, but Dorrell was looking for more veteran help, and declined the offer.
