USC vs. Notre Dame Pause Opens Door For Former Pac-12 Rivalry

Unlike Notre Dame, Stanford offers conference alignment without as many postseason question marks. A Big Ten vs. ACC matchup checks every modern box: playoff credibility, television value, and scheduling logic. It preserves tradition while operating cleanly within the College Football Playoff framework.

Notre Dame’s independence has long been a point of pride and a source of tension. The CFP has repeatedly accommodated the Irish, most recently through a memorandum of understanding that effectively guarantees Notre Dame playoff access if it finishes inside the top 12. That safety net does not exist for conference-bound programs navigating deeper league schedules. Independence is a choice. It also comes with consequences.

From USC’s perspective, the hesitation is not about tradition, it is about incentives. Adding a late-season non-conference game against an independent program with a protected playoff pathway introduces risk without clear reward. Stanford, by contrast, provides a high-quality opponent with shared structural stakes.

A Rivalry Worth Reviving

USC–Stanford is one of the West Coast’s oldest rivalries, dating back 118 years. USC leads the all-time series 65-34-3, including the vacated but widely acknowledged 2005 victory. The matchup produced conference title games, Heisman performances, and genuine postseason stakes across multiple eras.

Stanford dominated USC in the 2015 Pac-12 Championship Game behind Christian McCaffrey. USC responded in 2017, beating Stanford for its lone Pac-12 title of the past 14 years, with Sam Darnold authoring the final signature chapter of his career.

The most recent meeting came on Sept. 9, 2023, a 56-10 USC rout that felt like both a farewell to a storied rivalry and a warning shot to Big Ten by the Trojans as realignment reshaped the sport.

“This is potentially the last SC-Stanford game for a while,” Lincoln Riley said after the last matchup. “And this was a series … in recent years, had kinda went a little bit of a different way. So I’m really, kind of big-picture, proud of to be able to get kind of the final last two here.”

The Bigger Picture

While the loss of another rivalry is worth lamenting, and skepticism toward the sport’s leadership remains justified, USC’s position is understandable. USC-Stanford still fits the modern game. USC-Notre Dame, for now, does not.