It had been only two days since USC’s disappointing season came to a crushing conclusion against its crosstown rival, but Caleb Williams already was back under the lights. Cameras were rolling. A crowd was chanting his name. Ca-leb! Ca-leb! Ca-leb!
It’s the sort of scene USC’s star quarterback has grown increasingly familiar with through his second — and presumably last — season in L.A. as his exposure and expectations skyrocketed, a potent combination made all the more volatile by the Trojans’ second-half tailspin. Losing five of his last six games only ratcheted up the attention around the quarterback, challenging him in ways he’d never been challenged before.
By the end, as an ovation greeted him in the Coliseum tunnel after the loss to UCLA, Williams looked emotionally spent, worn down by an exhausting level of losing he’d never experienced.
A couple of days later and a couple of miles down Vermont Avenue, Williams seemed, at least for the moment, as though he’s rejuvenated. He smiled as a crowd of kids, gathered at the Challengers Boys & Girls Club in South L.A., roared upon his arrival, hanging on his every word.
