EUGENE, Ore. — They faced wave after relentless wave Saturday night:

Noise powerful enough to rattle loose their freckles.
An Oregon team that featured all types of gears and speeds.
An Oregon quarterback who, had he been playing for pay, would have put the bling in scrambling.
Then, early in the second half, the oddest obstacle of all for the USC Trojans — a double-digit deficit.
“Man, that hasn’t happened in the history of Pete Carroll,” said senior cornerback Josh Pickard, who has been at USC longer than most. “We never thought we’d give up anything like that.”
They gave up 31 first downs. They gave up 391 rushing yards. They gave up 613 total yards.
And the history extended back much farther than Carroll’s tenure.
To understand the gravity at work here, only one time in school history has a USC team permitted more total yards. That happened one year after the conclusion of World War II. Against Notre Dame, which, at the time, was being coached by Frank Leahy.
And they say the racket of Autzen Stadium can be disorienting?
In all, the Trojans gave up a Carroll-era record 47 points, losing, 47-20, the program’s worst defeat since let’s see here, go back, back, back John Robinson was coaching? In 1997? Believe it.
That’s right. Not even Paul Hackett’s teams ever were shoved around this badly.
“They just beat us up front; they just beat us up,” senior safety Taylor Mays said. “They hit us in the mouth and kept hitting us in the mouth.”
The Trojans, for the first time since anyone could remember, rocked back against the ropes and couldn’t summon an adequate counter punch.
Their NFL draft-depleted defense, wobbled in recent weeks by Notre Dame and Oregon State, was pancaked this time, landing on its young, still-learning fannies.
When this season began, six of USC’s front seven defenders were new. That innocence never was more obvious than Saturday.
“They knocked us out of our plan,” Carroll said. “Oregon did whatever they wanted. We just had a horrible time.”
This was a very strange place indeed for USC, down 10 points and then 14 points and then 21 as the air grew cooler and the night colder. And the season shorter.
“This was a real mess for us,” Carroll said. “We got run out of here.”
While on the subject of strange places, please note that the Trojans, who began this game with a chance to move atop the Pac-10 standings, now find themselves fourth in the conference.
Fourth?
Fourth!
Realize please, USC doesn’t do fourth. Not under Carroll. Not for nearly a decade. Not just among the 10 teams that make up its league.
Fourth in the vernacular of USC football means fourth in the country, which was where the Trojans were before they closed their eyes here and lived a nightmare.
They couldn’t seem to corral quarterback Jeremiah Masoli and couldn’t seem to find running back LaMichael James.
Carroll called Masoli “ridiculously effective.” The coach admitted he had scrambling runs that “broke our backs.” The coach said the Trojans “didn’t figure that would be a big issue.”
And it was James, understand, who went over 100 yards for the game before three minutes were gone in the second half.
The signature moments for the freshman running back came in the second quarter. On one play, he emerged peek-a-boo like from behind a wall of USC defenders, defying everything up to and including gravity en route to a 33-yard gain.
On the next play, he rolled straight downhill toward the Trojans’ end zone, his 5-foot-9, 180-pound frame dragging USC cornerback Kevin Thomas for nearly half of an 11-yard run.
And to think, it was USC receiver Ronald Johnson, who played this game with “See” and “Ya” written on his eye-black strips.
“When you’re not disciplined, you’re gonna get killed,” Mays said. “We didn’t play disciplined. It’s humbling.”
Before the game, linebacker Chris Galippo talked about how the Trojans were cherishing the assignment of facing a mobile quarterback, calling the challenge “our bread-and-butter.”
After watching Masoli rush 13 times for 164 net yards — he lost only one yard total — the challenge appeared less bread-and-butter, more salt-and-wound.
“Too many big plays,” linebacker Shane Horton said. “We gave them too many plays, especially on third down.”
By the end of the third quarter, Oregon (with 41) already had scored its most points ever against USC, a novel that just featured its 56th chapter.
That was the story of O in this game. It was much more that than any story of X and O.
“We like to say it’s always about us,” Mays said. “It was tonight. They didn’t out-scheme us. They didn’t play harder than us. They just beat us playing football, straight up. They beat us.”
Beat them all the way back to L.A., the Ducks did. And even farther back, too.