The biggest issue facing USC and UCLA football isn’t some mystery. It’s right there in front of everyone.
The Trojans opened their season Saturday with a 42-26 win over San José State at the Memorial Coliseum, but the scene around the game said plenty: a widely remarked upon fractional crowd, and brutal heat. Then on Monday, UCLA moved on from athletic director Martin Jarmond and pointed to financial challenges in making the change.
Put those together and the picture gets pretty clear. Whatever the old image of college football in Los Angeles used to be, this is not it.
USC’s teams once showed up in movies like The Godfather Part II, Die Hard and The Sopranos, and the band was playing on Tusk. The current Trojans probably don’t remember that era, and many of their parents likely don’t either.
A lot of theories have been tossed around to explain why USC and UCLA have been stuck in place. Some blame the city’s politics.
Some point to the teams not winning enough. Some say Los Angeles simply has too many distractions.
Some insist the city just doesn’t care about football. But that last one misses the point.
The issue is not that Los Angeles doesn’t love football. It’s that Los Angeles now has other football choices.
You can see the shift by looking back at 2015, the last fall before the NFL returned to Los Angeles. It wasn’t even a great year for either school.
USC came in ranked No. 8 and finished 8-6. UCLA started No. 13, went 8-5, and ended the season unranked.
Still, the Trojans averaged 75,358 fans at home that year. The Bruins drew 66,858, and they did it without bringing in any current Big Ten or SEC opponent.
A year later, the Rams were back from St. Louis, and the change was immediate.
USC’s attendance dropped to 68,459, with the Rams also playing in the Memorial Coliseum at the time. UCLA’s attendance actually rose a bit to 67,459.
But the bigger point is what happened next: the NFL slowly pulled casual fans of big-time football away from the college game, and the Trojans and Bruins didn’t adjust fast enough.
Then the Chargers arrived from San Diego in 2017, adding another pro option for football fans in the area. In 2018, the Rams won the NFC title. After that, the shiny new home at SoFi Stadium became the place where celebrities went to be seen.
For UCLA, that mattered a lot. SoFi Stadium is about 13 miles from Westwood by car, while the Rose Bowl is about 27.
In a city built around driving, that difference matters. If you’re a UCLA student looking for a weekend football outing, the closer option has a natural edge.
The same kind of pressure has shown up before in another city. New York once had a crowded college football scene, with Columbia, Fordham, Manhattan and NYU all drawing crowds in the early 20th century.
Army and Notre Dame also brought major attention when they played there. But after World War II, the car and television reshaped the sports landscape.
The Dodgers and Giants left, historic college venues like Ebbets Field and the Polo Grounds lost their footing, and pro football took over more of the city’s loyalty. The Giants and Jets became the dominant teams, and after the 1981 season, Columbia and the Ivy League stepped away from Division I-A.
USC and UCLA are not heading for FCS. Los Angeles still has plenty of football talent and plenty of people who care about the sport.
But as long as the Rams and Chargers are around, the Trojans and Bruins are competing in a much tougher market than they used to. In this city, the message is simple: win the attention economy or get squeezed by it.
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