Caleb Williams opens USC spring game with back-to-back touchdown drives, highlight throw
Caleb Williams wasted no time finding the end zone in his first appearance on the field at the LA Coliseum for USC.
The new Trojan quarterback opened USC’s spring game Saturday by hitting each of his first nine pass attempts for 90 yards and two scores. Both scores went to former Oklahoma wideout Mario Williams. Here’s the first:
First TD of the @USC_FB Spring Game:@CALEBcsw to @Lootrunnermario!
📺 @ESPN pic.twitter.com/4QTgBK540Y
— USC Trojans (@USC_Athletics) April 23, 2022
During an in-game interview with the ESPN broadcast team, Caleb Williams said that Mario, his teammate at Oklahoma last season, has been a major help for him in transitioning to a new team. Mario, Caleb says, has served as a kind of demonstration help when he wants to illustrate something for his new teammates. Clearly, there’s plenty of chemistry there.
Here’s the duo linking up again for a second score, one Mario had to work a little harder for than the first:
Two drives. Two touchdowns from Caleb Williams to Mario Williams. #FightOn
Caleb Williams is now 9-9 passing. pic.twitter.com/olyP5e2CCK
— CJ Vogel (@CJVogel_OTF) April 23, 2022
Nice, little throw from the quarterback there.
But the true highlight came a bit before:
here's caleb williams first true highlight as #USC quarterback pic.twitter.com/SkB3W9adAp
— Paolo Uggetti (@PaoloUggetti) April 23, 2022
Caleb Williams was off-limits to defenders all day, so the “pressure” bearing down on him wasn’t exactly true pressure, but that’s an off-base, 0ff-balance throw from Williams with a defender in his face and he dropped it to his receiver in-stride 30 yards downfield.
That’s an impressive throw. And Williams looked completely in control whenever he was on the field.
Williams has a tremendous amount of hype heading into the 2022 season. He was named to the 247Sports and ESPN True Freshman All-America teams after throwing for 1,912 yards, 21 touchdowns, and just four interceptions. He also ran for 442 yards and another six scores. He finished the season fourth nationally in total QBR (86.5).