LOS ANGELES — One side of the mouth commends the USC football team, while the other side condemns it.

It's becoming an annual rite of the Pacific-10 Conference's annual football season-opening gabfest.

The five-time defending champion Trojans were hung on the favorite's mantel for the six successive season, earning 38 of the 39 first-place votes, when the preseason poll of West Coast media members was released Thursday at the LAX Hilton.

USC was followed by Arizona State, which shared the conference title a year ago, Oregon and Cal, which earned the lone outstanding first-place nod.

Yet the class of the Pac-10 increasingly finds itself as a target.

It was first-year UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel who Thursday mirrored the memorable performance of Stanford's Jim Harbaugh a year ago "When we catch them," said Neuheisel of USC, "and I say when we catch them, we will not only have caught the leader in the (Pac-10), but we'll be amongst those programs who can rightfully challenge for the big prize."

Neuheisel, whose team was picked to finish fifth, made the bold prediction when asked about dealing with the Trojan "specter" across town, after lauding how USC coach Pete Carroll should be "commended" for the Trojans' "remarkable transformation."

"They're that elephant in the living room and they have earned it," said Neuheisel.

But they are also the hunted.

Last year, Harbaugh, asked about Carroll and USC after taking over a 1-11 team, pronounced that his Cardinal "bow to no man." Despite his opinion, revealed later at Pac-10 media day, that the Trojans "may be the best team in the history of college football."

Carroll drew laughter by remarking "You gotta love Jim, don't you," but, in one of the college football season's biggest twists, Harbaugh and Stanford got the last laugh by knocking off No. 2 USC, 24-23. The loss ended the Trojans' 35-game home winning streak and effectively kept them out of the Bowl Championship Series title game.

"It was a little bit of an upset," said USC linebacker Brian Cushing, understatedly.

And Carroll didn't respond to Neuheisel's vow Thursday with the jokes he previously reserved for Harbaugh. Asked if the fresh arrival of Neuheisel and former USC offensive coordinator Norm Chow in Westwood had altered the crosstown rivalry, Carroll seemed to bristle.

"I think it definitely does from a media standpoint, because you guys ask the question all the time," said Carroll.

The friction made for an interesting opening of the college football season during an otherwise bland affair in which peers of Carroll, Neuheisel and Harbaugh explained that they had an offense "built to move the ball and score points," "winning games" is how a losing program is "turned around," and "the game starts up front" yet "a veteran quarterback or emerging defense" is the foundation of a conference title run.

"We spend a lot of time talking about the little things," said Cal coach Jeff Tedford.