{"id":10851,"date":"2016-09-16T08:02:40","date_gmt":"2016-09-16T15:02:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/no-surprise-carrolls-seahawks-first-team-visiting-la\/"},"modified":"2016-09-16T08:02:40","modified_gmt":"2016-09-16T15:02:40","slug":"no-surprise-carrolls-seahawks-first-team-visiting-la","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/sports\/no-surprise-carrolls-seahawks-first-team-visiting-la\/","title":{"rendered":"No surprise Carroll’s Seahawks first team visiting LA"},"content":{"rendered":"

RENTON, Wash. <\/strong>\u2014 During his decade in Los Angeles, Pete Carroll felt the void.<\/p>\n

Even though USC football was the biggest thing in the Los Angeles area during the 2000s and Carroll was the architect behind the dominant Trojans, there was something missing in the football community without the NFL.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just didn\u2019t feel right,\u201d Carroll said. \u201cThere was a hole there that was so obvious. That\u2019s why the league was so adamant and so diligent about staying with it and eventually getting it done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perhaps it\u2019s just coincidence \u2014 but most likely not \u2014 that Carroll\u2019s Seattle Seahawks will be the first visiting NFL team to play in Los Angeles in 22 years when they face the Rams on Sunday. Six other teams will visit the Coliseum this season. Many of those will have a number of players from California, typically one of the top states for producing NFL players.<\/p>\n

But few of those will match the connections and history that the Seahawks have.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is still a connection. It was that deep of an experience with the fans and the school and the community and all that,\u201d Carroll said.<\/p>\n

Carroll has the most obvious history from his nine years as the head coach at USC. He arrived at USC under heavy scrutiny as a twice-fired NFL reject and made the Trojans champions again.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw it really as an opportunity,\u201d Carroll said. \u201cOur first game we played San Jose State and there were like 40,000 people there. When there\u2019s 40,000 people in that stadium it\u2019s like there\u2019s nobody home, it\u2019s like a spring game. I was kind of disappointed, I was like, \u2018This is what it\u2019s like?\u2019 It changed after a while. It was always obvious to me that there were tremendous opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are others who are relishing their opportunity to play in LA. Seattle linebacker Bobby Wagner grew up 45 minutes from the Coliseum and hoped to play for the Trojans in college. He ended up at Utah State instead, making this weekend his first opportunity to play in the venerable stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I saw that on the schedule I definitely was excited to not only play my first game in L.A., but to also play the first game since whenever it was,\u201d Wagner said. \u201cI think it\u2019s a fun opportunity, we have a lot of California guys that are looking forward to it. I\u2019ve never gotten a chance to have all my family there. I have family who can\u2019t travel because of certain things, so to be 45 minutes away and have them come see a game, I\u2019m looking forward to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Richard Sherman also has a lengthy history, one that Carroll would rather forget. During his time at Stanford, Sherman was part of two of the more memorable Cardinal wins at the Coliseum.<\/p>\n

Sherman caught a key fourth down pass on the winning drive of Stanford\u2019s 24-23 upset of USC in 2007 that ended the Trojans\u2019 35-game home winning streak. Two years later, Sherman came back as a cornerback and returned an interception 43 yards for a touchdown in Stanford\u2019s 55-21 blowout that became known as the \u201cWhat\u2019s your deal\u201d game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sure it\u2019s going to be huge for Pete, it\u2019s going to be cool,\u201d Sherman said. \u201cHe has a lot of good memories and some bad memories in that stadium. It\u2019s going to be fun. I have a lot of great memories, very fond.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

NOTES:<\/strong> QB Russell Wilson practiced Wednesday despite the sprained right ankle suffered in Sunday\u2019s win. \u201cHis attitude is as charged up as you can imagine,\u201d Carroll said. … Carroll said RB Thomas Rawls will get the start against the Rams. Christine Michael was the starter in the opener. … RB C.J. Prosise is practicing this week but has a large protective club on his right hand after suffering a small bone fracture in the opener.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RENTON, Wash. \u2014 During his decade in Los Angeles, Pete Carroll felt the void. Even though USC football was the biggest thing in the Los Angeles area during the 2000s and Carroll was the architect behind the dominant Trojans, there was something missing in the football community without the NFL. \u201cIt just didn\u2019t feel right,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-10851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10851\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10851"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=10851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}