In each of Lincoln Riley<\/a>\u2019s four seasons at the helm here, he\u2019s trotted out impressive offenses and unimpressive defenses and \u2014 surprise, surprise \u2014 gotten the same result each time: something short of the College Football Playoff.<\/p>\n Riley\u2019s teams have averaged more yards per play in his tenure than any other team in the nation.<\/p>\n But it hasn\u2019t mattered much, because the best that a USC team has ranked defensively in that span was last year, when the Trojans gave up 23 points per game \u2014 51st in the nation. That left them 9-4 after losing to Texas Christian<\/a> in the Alamo Bowl.<\/p>\n Now we\u2019ll find out whether in Season 5, Riley\u2019s Trojans have a defense on par with the offense.<\/p>\n Whether this season, with Gary Patterson<\/a> serving as USC\u2019s third defensive coordinator in Riley\u2019s tenure, will be different. <\/p>\n They said so leading up to Saturday\u2019s season-opening 42-26 victory<\/a> over San Jos\u00e9 State, but the game certainly didn\u2019t sell anyone on it.<\/p>\n No, USC\u2019s win over a Spartans team that\u2019s incorporating 48 new players isn\u2019t going to definitively tell us anything.<\/p>\n But with Patterson on the USC sideline for the first time, gesticulating and sweating in the coaches\u2019 all-black attire, it did drop some concerning clues.<\/p>\n In 90-plus-degree heat, that \u2019fit was questionable. So too was his defense, at times.<\/p>\n In other moments, reasons for optimism: The Trojans pitched a first-half shutout. There was the play in which freshman defensive end Luke Wafle ran through two Spartans blockers like a hot knife through butter. Linebackers coach Mike Ekeler\u2019s guys hit and hit hard.<\/p>\n Junior defensive tackle Jide Abasiri had four tackles, 2\u00bd for loss \u2014 including one that\u2019s the kind of play Riley has been dreaming of seeing from his defense: On fourth and one at USC\u2019s seven-yard line, Abasiri zipped past a pair of blockers and swallowed up running back Isaiah Carlson. <\/p>\n \u201cThe fourth-down stop in the red zone, that\u2019s something that we have spent a lot of time talking about,\u201d Riley said. \u201cRed-zone defense and how that equates. If you look at the top teams in the country over the last several years, typically the top red-zone defenses equal out with that; like, it\u2019s the same teams.\u201d<\/p>\n But the Trojans otherwise did not perform like one of those \u201ctop teams.\u201d<\/p>\n They took their proverbial foot off the gas, ran out of gas, sputtered to the finish line, got outscored 23-7 in the fourth quarter and looked like anything but a team with serious playoff plans.<\/p>\n They looked thin. And, mostly, like a typical Riley-era Trojans team.<\/p>\n The second-string secondary triggered second thoughts. Trojan safeties were beaten multiple times, including on a 28-yard pass from Spartans quarterback Luke Weaver to Jerry McClure over freshman Madden Riordan, which made it 35-9 with 14:56 to play in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n San Jos\u00e9 State quarterback Luke Weaver passes during the first quarter against USC on Saturday.<\/p>\n (Ronaldo Bolanos \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n And maybe it was the focus-sapping heat, but USC\u2019s defense wasn\u2019t as stifling, not as suffocating it should have been against an opponent as hopelessly overmatched as San Jos\u00e9 State.<\/p>\n The Spartans finished with 336 total yards. Weaver looked increasingly comfortable, with more time to operate than he should\u2019ve had against a defense that\u2019s going to be needed to keep top teams like Oregon, Washington, Ohio State and Indiana in check.<\/p>\n The Spartans\u2019 new starter went 21 for 32 for 234 yards \u2014 including 74 yards in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n \u201cIt took a little bit to settle in, but I\u2019m really proud of just the resolve of our team,\u201d Weaver said.<\/p>\n The Spartans should be proud, and the Trojans should be ashamed.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fourth quarter was not up to our standards,\u201d Riley said. \u201cObviously, we played a bunch of different guys, a lot of guys got opportunities and we had several that did not play the way that we anticipated. There\u2019ll be a lot to learn and grow from it because we\u2019re going to need the depth.<\/p>\n \u201cWe challenged that in the fourth quarter and obviously didn\u2019t respond the way we wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n It leaves teaching moments aplenty for Patterson, who took three years off after his two-decade Texas Christian tenure ended in 2021.<\/p>\n The Hall of Fame coach is taking over for D\u2019Anton Lynn<\/a>, who bolted for his alma mater Penn State after two meh seasons. Lynn replaced Alex Grinch<\/a>, who was fired before finishing his second season leading a defense that was porous and poor, ranking as the 94th and 121st most generous defense in the nation in 2022 and \u201923, respectively.<\/p>\n Patterson brought his 4-2-5 defensive scheme. And his energy and experience, as well as his track record \u2014 five times his Horned Frogs had the nation\u2019s No. 10-ranked defense.<\/p>\n Now if USC has any hope of making the playoff under Riley, it needs its defense to at least be among the best in the country.<\/p>\n It needs to answer the question: How can a team expect to be complimented if it can\u2019t play complementary football?<\/p>\n It can\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"How can you have any pudding if you don\u2019t eat your meat? How can you compete for championships…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1032377,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,262,33353,120885,23590,412937,2961,60839,224,5337,412936,1245,5039,5950,412935,3007,6620,36418,11016],"class_list":["post-1032376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-ca","tag-california","tag-defense","tag-fourth-quarter","tag-gary-patterson","tag-guy","tag-impressive-offense","tag-la","tag-lincoln-riley","tag-los-angeles","tag-losangeles","tag-more-yard","tag-nation","tag-play","tag-season","tag-spartans-team","tag-team","tag-time","tag-trojans","tag-usc"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117182675679936347","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032376","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1032376"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032376\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1032377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1032376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1032376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1032376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1788065617_184_hqdefault.jpg\")
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