USC vs. UCLA: O.J. Simpson’s legacy leaves tangled emotions 50 years after ‘Game of the Century Decades before he sat in a downtown Los Angeles courtroom, O.J. Simpson loomed in the backfield on a football field six miles away, his hands resting above grass-stained knee pads. Simpson cast an imposing presence, a towering 6-foot-2 tailback with a sprinter’s smooth stride. As a late fall afternoon in 1967 waned, he crouched in the backfield, steadying for another run. The Trojans trailed UCLA by six points. Ten minutes remained. Needing eight yards on third down, quarterback Toby Page called an audible and triggered one of the most exhilarating finishes the city — and quite possibly the rest of the country — had ever seen from a football star. As Simpson took the handoff, he charged left for seven yards, then grabbed 57 more, zigzagging across the Coliseum turf with his unique blend of grit and grace. A crowd of more than 90,000 stood in awe and roared when he reached ...