College Football Corner: Trojans vs. Irish

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- On Wall Street, it's third-quarter earnings season, a time when investors gauge the health, or lack thereof, of corporate America. In the college football world this Saturday, three headliner matchups will allow fans and pollsters to gauge the BCS-title worthiness of at least three squads: Southern Cal, Texas and Virginia Tech, each of which face a stiff test against a longtime rival.

No. 5 USC (4-1) at No. 25 Notre Dame (4-1), 3:30 p.m. EDT, NBC: They used to call it the Glamour Game. But for Notre Dame fans these last seven years, the more operative term to describe the annual tilt with arch-enemy USC has been infamy: seven losses, six of them blowouts. Nary a touchdown scored since 2006. One fired head coach (Ty Willingham) and another one in danger of the same fate, should his team, his most experienced since his first year on the job in 2005, fail to play competitively at home against the Trojans.

N.D. head man Charlie Weis knows what's at stake. Not for nothing has he gone all-in recruiting wise, inviting dozens of top-rated high-school football stars to South Bend for the game. If the Irish can claim victory, or at least keep the score tight on Saturday, the talent will continue to flow onto campus. Should the team throw up another disaster like last year's 38-3 evisceration, Weis' time under the Dome will be in serious jeopardy, and Notre Dame's attempt to claw back onto the national scene delayed for who knows how long.

Golden Tate, Notre Dame

The former Patriots offensive coordinator will bring to bear on the Trojans this year his most prolific outfit since 2005. Ranked No. 10 in total offense, the 2009 version of the Irish boast perhaps their best pure-passing signal caller since the days of Joe Montana. Sudden golden boy Jimmy Clausen is the nation's highest-rated quarterback through five games and has officially entered the Heisman conversation, but he'll nonetheless come into the USC game with much to prove.

Critics note that Notre Dame's four wins this season have come against lesser competition. None of those opponents sport a defense close to the caliber of the one Clausen will face on Saturday.