USC hires Helton as coach

Helton guided the troubled Trojans (8-4, 5-3 Pac-12) to five victories and a Pac-12 South title in his seven-week tenure after taking over for Steve Sarkisian, making him 6-2 in two interim stints over the past three years.

Athletic director Pat Haden announced Helton had signed a multiyear deal. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Helton has been at USC since 2010 and was retained by Sarkisian as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in 2014. Although Browne believes he could thrive in any offensive system, he was thrilled to learn he will be playing in 2016 under Helton, the quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator who recruited him out of the Seattle suburbs.

The Trojans beat UCLA 40-21 on Saturday to win the Pac-12 South and clinch a spot in the conference title game against Stanford this Saturday. Todd Helton gets the job full-time and the Trojans will get another shot against Stanford for a chance to go to the Rose Bowl.

“Toward the beginning of the season, I felt like we really didn’t have an identity as a team”, Davis said.

There was no doubt that the players were absolutely behind the prospect of hiring Helton, with vocal support in interviews and on social media, but that support was certainly display at another level when the announcement was made. In explaining the hire, Haden raved far more about Helton’s integrity than performance on the field, offering more than a few subtle nods to the instability of USC’s past two coaches.

“During my six years here, I have learned the standard of excellence that it takes to be a Trojan”, Helton said.

A couple of weeks ago it was written in this space that Helton, 43, was the best coach for this job.

The new face of arguably the nation’s most glamorous college football program is only recognizable when his face is shrouded in a baseball cap. “This place is extremely unique, and to understand the ins and outs of it, to understand what the Trojan family wants and needs, to understand how the relationship with the players that you have and how you carry that on a day-to-day basis – I think that’s extremely important”. Chris Petersen has the Huskies trending up and I’m sure next year Washington will be a trendy team in the pre-season. Didn’t have many victories this season but won a moral victory to close the season. “He’s done a really good job of that all year, whether he’s had the ball or he hasn’t had the ball”.

Heisman Trophy candidate Christian McCaffrey and David Shaw, the Bradford M. Freeman Director of Football, earned top Pac-12 Conference honors on Tuesday.