Trojans fire Helton two games into season
LOS ANGELES — When Clay Helton was first elevated to head coach, after years of scandal and impropriety surrounding Southern Cal football, he was viewed as a virtuous caretaker, capable of restoring a troubled program with a new sense of integrity and stability.
But virtue, amid towering expectations, was not enough. After years of unfulfilled promises and festering fan frustration over the direction of USC’s underachieving football program, the Trojans fired Helton just two games into his sixth full season.
USC athletic director Mike Bohn twice opted to keep Helton — who was a University of Houston player and assistant coach for his father, Kim — as coach even in the face of fierce ire from the Trojans’ fanbase. But by Monday, in the wake of a disastrous defeat to Stanford two nights earlier, Bohn’s patience had finally worn thin.
“As I committed to upon my arrival at USC, during the past two offseasons we provided every resource necessary for our football program to compete for championships,” Bohn said in a statement. “The added resources carried significantly increased expectations for our team’s performance, and it is already evident that, despite the enhancements, those expectations would not be met without a change in leadership.”
Associate head coach Donte Williams is set to serve as USC’s interim coach. He is the first Black coach in Trojans football history. Bohn said he made the decision to fire Helton and elevate Williams with the hope of salvaging the Trojans’ 2021 campaign.
“This season is just getting started and we have the opportunity to really do something special with this team and this program,” Bohn said. “We still have control of our own destiny in the Pac-12 Conference, a tremendously talented group of student-athletes, and complete faith in the phenomenal assistant coaches and outstanding support staff in the John McKay Center.”
It’s unclear if any further staff changes are on the horizon.
The decision to fire the embattled coach comes in the wake of a deeply disappointing 42-28 loss to
Stanford on Saturday at the Coliseum, one of the worst defeats in recent memory for the Trojans. But the tension surrounding USC’s football program had been building over multiple tumultuous seasons. Fan discontent was already swelling after USC struggled before eventually pulling away from San Jose State in its season opener. It reached a feverish pitch Saturday, as boos cascaded through a half-empty Coliseum amid USC’s most lopsided loss at home to an unranked opponent since 2000.
Faced that night with all-too-familiar questions about his future, Helton pleaded for more time during his postgame news conference.
“Let’s see at the end of the year,” Helton said. “Let’s see. It’s Game 2. It’s Game 2. I have total
faith in this staff. I have total faith in the men that are in there, players, coaches. We didn’t play our best tonight. But I know this. At the end of the season, see where we’re at.”
Instead, Helton was fired two days later, closing his tenure as USC’s coach with a 46-24 record. His win percentage (.657) ranks ninth in USC football history, sandwiched between the Trojans’ last two fired coaches, Lane Kiffin and Steve Sarkisian, both of whom were also fired early in the season.
Helton still had two years remaining on his contract, which was extended after he led USC to his only Pac-12 championship during the 2017 season. The Trojans were just 19-15 since, but still Helton managed to cling to his job, even as the athletic director who
extended him, Lynn Swann, was fired in September 2019.
Middling performance and swelling outrage among USC boosters apparently outweighed any concerns that came with paying a hefty buyout in the midst of a financial crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. That price tag, which has been difficult to pin down because USC is a private school not required to release contracts in response to public records requests, was believed to be one of the primary factors in Bohn‘s previous decisions to retain Helton.
Many thought USC might part ways with Helton after last season’s Pac-12 championship game loss to Oregon, which capped a year marked by more unfilled promises of progress. USC closed
the 2020 season in the same position it was at the end of the 2019 campaign, when Bohn made the controversial decision to give Helton another chance.
As the health crisis wiped out games in 2020 and threatened to upend the season at any moment, the Trojans managed to win their first five contests and earned a place on the fringes of the College Football Playoff semifinal conversation. But three of those victories required furious comebacks in the final minute against teams that would finish with a 5-11 record during the shortened season. The luck finally ran out during the Pac-12 title game loss. USC did not earn a bowl bid and entered the offseason with more questions that Helton ultimately ran out of time to address.