I ain’t rollin’ over and dyin’, Billy Madison once said.

Come Jan. 1, don’t expect the Illini to, either.

Already 13-point underdogs and written off by likely everyone outside Champaign, the Illini really have a much better chance in this game than everyone seems to think they do.

I hate to use the “us against the world” cliché, especially because I am not on the football team, but the Illini have heard all year about why they can’t. Not too many people thought at the beginning of the year that this team would even come out of the season with a bowl bid, let alone a BCS berth.

After the Iowa debacle, not too many thought the Illini would even recover from that loss and reel off four straight victories to close out the season, including one of the biggest wins in school history at Ohio State.

So, please, excuse me if I am a little skeptical of the fact that the omnipotent prognosticators at ESPN are saying that Illinois has no chance whatsoever.

“Illinois is a three-loss team from a bad Big Ten,” ESPN’s Pat Forde said in a bowl preview. “(They have) no business being in the BCS.”

Excuse me, Pat. Illinois may play in the Big Ten, but last I checked its strength of schedule was 10th in the nation. And those mighty Trojans that everyone seems to love so much came in considerably lower at No. 75.

I don’t see why people are so sure that the Trojans will just waltz all over this Illini team like Fred Astaire. Granted the Trojans are 10-2 on the season, but they have lost to an Oregon team that is similar to the Illini, and they narrowly escaped losses against Washington (27-24), Arizona (20-13) and Cal (24-17) that, if they are as good people are making it out to be, they should have demolished.

I would hope that people like Forde would understand, especially during this completely upside-down season of college football rankings, that upsets are becoming much more commonplace, especially when there are two teams that have this much talent on the field.

The two teams have “playmakers” on both sides of the ball. USC’s players were likely more highly touted players in high school, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are better. And as much talk as there has been of parity in professional sports lately, college sports will always trump their paid counterparts in upsets and unlikely victories.

Look at last year’s Boise State team in the Fiesta Bowl. Look at the same bowl venue four years earlier when Ohio State had another thrilling victory against a Miami team that was favored then, too. If you make it to a BCS bowl game, chances are you have done something to earn it there – even Hawaii and Colt “Bro” Brennan, as much as it pains me to say that.

Like that Miami team in 2002, this USC offense gets credit for being “explosive” and having “burners” and all the other superlatives. But it really has been its defense this year that has been much more impressive than its offense, which has lacked consistency, especially at wide receiver.

The USC defense against the Illinois offense appears to me to be much more important than the other way around. Illinois will have to use its offensive systematically against this USC defense the way that Oregon did.

The spread offense worked well against the USC defense when the Ducks ran it, granted there are considerable personnel differences with Illinois, but it is worth noting, nevertheless. The offenses aren’t identical, but they are in the same family and I would imagine that there is something to be taken away from that game to the Illini’s advantage.

It is debatable, but I would argue that the Illini offense, where it is at now, is at least comparable to how well Oregon was playing at the time of its defeat of the Trojans.

While Juice Williams might not be where senior Dennis Dixon was, experience-wise, at the time, Williams is undeniably at the best point of his career, so far. But if Williams wants to pass the ball with any consistency and have time to throw, the running game will have to be working well so the USC defense can’t key on the pass.

Fortunately, for Williams – and Illinois – I would venture that Rashard Mendenhall is better in most every aspect of the game than the Ducks’ Jonathan Stewart. It won’t be a cake walk, but given that the Illini have rushed for nearly 3,200 yards on the season and showed they can run against a dominant defense in the Ohio State game, it stands to reason that they have a good shot on the ground, and in the game.

Daniel Johnson is a junior in Communications. He can be reached at [email protected]