USC Football Notes: Could Ishmael Sopsher make his Trojans debut Saturday?

Ishmael Sopsher is still as much an unknown commodity as any of USC's other nose tackles were entering the season, but the potential of that unknown has remained a source of hope for the Trojans nonetheless.

Sopsher was a top-100 national prospect in the 2019 recruiting class, out of Amite, La., when he signed with Alabama. He was one of USC's marquee offseason transfer additions, joining the Trojans after appearing in just one game over two years with the Crimson Tide. And, of course, he plays the position of most glaring need for this team.

Well, after months of uncertainty and hard-to-quantify progress, it sounds like there's a chance Sopsher could make his long-awaited debut soon -- perhaps even as soon as this weekend as USC travels to Notre Dame.

"We’ll see his conditioning moving forward, but we want to play him and we’ll see how he finishes up the rest of the week," defensive coordinator Todd Orlando said after practice Wednesday.

So, is it a question of if he plays or how much he plays?

"Well I think it’s, if he finishes up the way he has done in the last week to the last couple days, it’ll be how much," Orlando said.

For a defense that has given up a combined 1,021 total yards to its last two opponents with winning records (including 502 on the ground), the 6-foot-4, 330-pound Sopsher would be a notable addition heading into a clash with the No. 13-ranked Fighting Irish.

"One, he's huge. Secondly, he's very athletic. So it's hard to find big men that are athletic and he's both," interim head coach Donte Williams had said on Tuesday. "So just another guy that will be quality as far as us on the depth but also a big-time player."

Depth is the main key here.

Not to rehash the story time and again -- defensive line coach Vic So'oto, who was not available to reporters Wednesday, has made it clear previously that he's tired of answering questions about the matter -- but USC not only lost starting nose tackle Marlon Tuipulotu to the NFL draft but then lost its two most likely replacements.

Veteran Brandon Pili tore his Achilles tendon during spring practice and impressive freshman Jay Toia transferred to UCLA after the spring. Add in Sopsher's extended absence since undergoing surgery before the spring for compartment syndrome in his leg and the Trojans' expected depth chart was essentially entirely wiped out.

Redshirt sophomore Stanley Ta'ufo'ou, who had played just 34 defensive snaps last season and wasn't even much in the conversation in the spring, vaulted into the starting role over the second half of fall camp and has played 66.5 percent of the defensive snaps this season. Redshirt freshman Jamar Sekona, who rotated with Toia in the spring and looked primed for a large role, missed time due to illness during fall camp and suddenly fell out of the mix for whatever reason. He's played just 18 percent of the snaps this season, while at other times in pass-rushing downs the Trojans have gotten creative with their defensive front.

Either way, the position has not been ideal to this point. Can Sopsher make an impact over the final six games? Hard to say. Again, he really has no significant college football experience to speak of to this point, but the potential is what's intriguing.

"I'm feeling pretty good. I've been getting a lot of reps with the team and stuff like that, and I'm getting back used to feeling good," Sopsher said Wednesday. "I'm not really feeling any limitations. I've just been working really hard -- now it's time for me to get back on the field and just help out the best way I can."

Sopsher himself wouldn't confirm whether he was even on the travel roster for the game this weekend, but Orlando's comments are hard to ignore.

Sopsher started getting mixed into the full team periods for the first time leading into the Colorado game a few weeks ago and the commentary all along has been that he simply needs to build up his conditioning and stamina.

"I'm just taking it day by day. Every day I feel like I'm improving, but slowly but surely I'll be good," he said Wednesday. "I've been out for over a year now, so I'm just ready to get back out there and just put on a great performance."

USC rarely does any one-on-one drills during the window that reporters are allowed to takes photos and videos, but Wednesday was an exception. Here's what we captured from that period:

Sopsher was one of the main players Orlando said he wanted to evaluate during USC's "young guy scrimmage" last Thursday over the bye week. He's also the only one that the defensive coordinator mentioned by name when asked what stood out to him from that session.

"Some of the other DBs did a really good job, so it was really productive. They were out there on their own, just playing. They played really fast, and they’re guys that are going to help us," Orlando said. "We expected that when we put them out there, but we just wanted to watch them compete without any coaching, without anything else, and just evaluate the film. ...

"There’s a dynamic that goes into just calling base stuff and then a dynamic to, this is our gameplan, how well can they get it and what can they handle? Then the environment of being at Notre Dame too. All of this goes into play, and they just gotta prove to us. They’ve done a really good job the last couple days with it, but before you anoint somebody, you let the week finish out, then we’ll see where we’re at. There’s nothing that says to me that some of these guys that I talked about beforehand aren’t going to be able to help us."

Orlando was asked about two other young players specifically.

One being freshman linebacker Raesjon Davis, who was one of the Trojans' top recruits and just happens to play a position where the performance from the veterans has been largely underwhelming.

"He's good, man. Like I said beforehand, we want to play him, he's showing us that he's accountable in practice reps. We're just trying to find the right spot for him just to utilize him," Orlando said. "He does some things really, really well and some [other] stuff he needs to improve on, but we want to play him and he knows that so he's got to just prove it to us in practice."

Another player discussed was redshirt freshman safety Chris Thompson Jr., who was sidelined for a few weeks with injury but is back practicing again.

It sounds like the Trojans have a more specific plan for the intriguing Auburn transfer.

"It's good. He's kind of a hybrid guy that can play kind of a nickel SAM, which I think at this point right now we're trying to utilize his skill set as much as possible and try to keep Drake [Jackson] as kind of a guy who can keep his hand in the ground and do very limited things with him and just let him excel at the D-line play," Orlando said. "So Chris gives us some flexibility to be able to use him as a bigger body nickel."

...

Lastly, Wednesday, Orlando was asked how tough this fall has been for him personally, with the defense unable to find any consistency while giving up 42 or more points in three of the last five games.

"It's what it is, you know what I'm saying. You grind, you go through it, you try to find the answers, you work, you evaluate yourself, you evaluate what we're doing, you evaluate what's best for these guys' skill set and you just keep going. That's all you can do," he said. "You can't sit back and kind of overanalyze stuff. You can't sit back and sit there and want to point fingers. That's not what we do. That's not what I have ever done.

"All I try to do is what can make us better, is there something that we're missing, is there some piece of this puzzle that we can place together and get this thing righted? And me personally, that's all I've done in the last couple of weeks is went back and just evaluated every play that we've had this year, evaluated what we're doing in practice, evaluated who are the guys that are playing the best for us right now and what are they really good at, and hopefully that's what you'll see on Saturday."