Trojans stripped of 2004 national title
The Bowl Championship Series stripped USC of its 2004 national championship Monday as a result of major infractions stemming from the ineligibility of former tailback Reggie Bush.
Punished · Less than two weeks after the NCAA denied USC’s appeal, the BCS took away the Trojans’ 2004 national championship. - Summer Trojan file photo
As a result of the ruling, USC must vacate the results of the 2005 Orange Bowl, the 2004 national title game in which USC defeated Oklahoma 55-19, as well as the 2006 Rose Bowl, in which the Trojans lost to Texas 41-38 in the final minutes.
“The BCS alerted us today that their presidents have voted to vacate USC’s 2005 BCS Championship Game victory,” USC Athletic Director Pat Haden said in a statement. “This was not an unexpected outcome. We will comply with all requirements mandated by the result of this BCS vote.”
The announcement comes 11 days after USC’s appeal of last June’s sanctions, which included a two-year postseason ban and a loss of 30 scholarships over three seasons, was denied by the NCAA’s Infractions Appeals Committee.
The BCS was only waiting for the appeals process to be completed, before making its ruling official.
“The BCS arrangement crowns a national champion, and the BCS games are showcase events for postseason football,” BCS Executive Director Bill Hancock said in a statement. “One of the best ways of ensuring that they remain so is for us to foster full compliance with NCAA rules. Accordingly, in keeping with the NCAA’s recent action, USC’s appearances are being vacated.”
As a result, there will no BCS champion for the 2004-2005 season.
“This action reflects the scope of the BCS arrangement and is consistent with the NCAA’s approach when it subsequently discovers infractions by institutions whose teams have played in NCAA championship events,” Hancock said.
USC will still keep its Associated Press National Championship.
Suck it up and move on. The NC2 doesn’t want to see a West Coast school dominate in D1 football. When Trojans manhandle SEC teams, they get flustered and embarrassed. I was proudly wearing my SC baseball cap at the UT Austin campus last week, because I had to visit my girlfriend there. I was laughing at all the dirty stares I received. I was like “giyeah, bring on the hatuhs!”
There are so many Lawyers around USC, in fact Pat Haden is one!! What ever happened to “FIGHT ON”?????
They can take away anything they want to, but, as everyone knows, those games and Titles were won by the Trojans on the Field of Play, and the memories cannot be taken away, ever!!
All the Major Conferences should band together and form a new Governing Body & get rid of the Pompous Idiots in NCAA. We volunteer to participate in this Crooked, Monopolistic Program that makes up the rules as it goes, to serve itself.
Life is too short to put u with incompetence.
What a bunch of cheaters. I don’t know how anyone could still praise the accomplishments of this skewed and greedy program. It will not be so easy for USC to win games at all, left alone championships, now that they can no longer pay their players. 20-16
Still the only National Champions that year! kept the AP. BCS doesnt want USC to play in the BCS champ game anyway…they effectivley kept us completely out of it in 2003, so they were forced by outcry to let us in the next two years. now they get to do what they wanted to do in the first place, keep USC out of range of their beloved SEC teams.
The man responsible for all this owes the University an apology. We as students, alumni, faculty were humiliated this week by being the first football program in the country stripped of a national championship.
What this man failed to realize is that he represented an intuition and tradition that is much more bigger and precious that any-one athlete. It is an honor and privilege to wear the cardinal & gold! And this man’s unscrupulous behavior has tarnish our football program.
I hope Pat Haden unretires #5 from the rest of the Trojan legends.
FIGHT ON TROJANS!!
Go ahead and take the trophy and erase the stats from the record books, but you can’t take away the great memories. Our guys won that game on the field where it truly counts and Choklahoma knows it.
Bull!