USC Training Camp Stories Stay Consistent

Every year players get bigger, teams discover unity.

It is a staple of training camp that players are bigger, stronger and faster than the previous season. And the team is more together. And hungrier.

There's little way to really verify this, of course, when everything is closed to the public and media.

But even when practices were fully open, it didn't mean all the pre-season hype was true.

The way I view it, the value of all this is minimal. What does matter is the Pac-12 schedule, which looks too good to be true.

• USC safety Talanoa Hufanga said today players will wake up at 5:15 for 6 a.m. COVID tests. Maybe that 9 a.m. kickoff vs. Arizona State won't mean much.