How stupidly self-serving was the stunt Pete Carroll pulled at the end of Saturday night’s USC-UCLA game? In a move that screamed "I am a classless egomaniac!" Trojans coach Carroll (who I generally think is a less-egregious offender than most of his peers. … But hey, this is a diatribe …) ran it up on his arch-rivals after Bruins counterpart Rick Neuheisel had the audacity to call a timeout in the final minute with his team trailing 21-7. I’m sure Neuheisel was simply trying to instill a never-quit-till-the-final-whistle mentality in his players, but to Carroll, this was license to play, "Who’s Your Daddy?" On the next play quarterback Matt Barkley ran a play-fake and went up top to receiver Damian Williams for a 48-yard touchdown. The worst part was Carroll’s smug, over-the-top, vindictive reaction on the sidelines, which predictably provoked a UCLA response (numerous players headed toward the ‘SC bench area) that could have led to a massive brawl. Even worse, when questioned about the move after the game, Carroll gave this condescending response: "You’re either competing or you’re not. We’ve been saying it for years. We’ve been living it for years. If you really believe in competing, if you really do, you’ll understand it."

Gee, Pete, I guess you operate on a higher plane of competitive understanding than the rest of us, and the mere act of questioning your sense of competitive justice is a misguided affront to your greatness. Except that, as I recall, it was only 14 days earlier on the same L.A. Coliseum field that you were completely undone by the impudence of Stanford’s Jim Harbaugh, who had the audacity to call for a two-point conversion in the fourth quarter of a 55-24 butt-whipping. Reportedly, as you approached Harbaugh after the game, you barked, "What’s your deal? What’s your deal?" Well, so much for seizing the moral high ground, Pete. Now we all know your deal, and I guess it’s something along the lines of, "How dare you run up the score on me? But if I do it to you I’ll prance around like a sixth-grade bully and justify it as enhanced competitive comprehension." That’s charming, and it casts the university that employs you in such a sublime light.
-Michael Silver, Yahoo Sports