Caleb Williams explains his feelings of performing in front of fans inside The Coliseum
Caleb Williams is expected to become the next face of USC football, following Lincoln Riley from Oklahoma to Southern California with dreams of greatness. On Saturday, the former Sooners quarterback had his first taste of performing in-front of fans at The Coliseum.
Afterwards, Williams spoke about whether he was nervous for the Trojans spring game, and what it was like seeing USC faithful come out in droves.
“I don’t really get nervous. It was really cool,” revealed Williams. “Hopefully we get to pack it out really soon. But it was awesome. Coming out here, getting in-front of a couple fans. Having ESPN and all that. So, showing the public what we’re going to be, and we’re not even close to what we’re actually going to be. It’s awesome.”
Caleb Williams has huge expectations on his shoulders for his first season at USC. If he can perform like he did last season at Oklahoma, fans will come out and make their presence felt for the Trojans more than ever.
Caleb Williams explains how USC’s culture has changed under Lincoln Riley
Following last season’s disappointing 4-8 campaign, the USC Trojans were in need of a complete reset on and off the field. When USC hired Lincoln Riley as the team’s next head football coach, he immediately got to work on rebuilding the culture within the Trojans program.
Following USC’s spring game on Saturday, Trojans quarterbacks Caleb Williams went in depth on how important Riley’s emphasis on leadership has been as the team has tried to rebuild the culture inside the program. To Williams, Riley has done a great job at instilling tiers of leadership.
“We’ve had a bunch of guys on this team that the previous year didn’t do so well,” Williams said. “We got guys on this team that want to win the ball, want to win big games. We’ve been doing that, we’ve been progressing and doing pretty well with that. But a big part of it is being coachable. Sometimes you just gotta eat, it, whatever it is, you gotta take it. Coach, I mean he might say something that you might not like. You gotta listen to what he says. I mean he is your coach. But also just the culture fact of these guys here, we have a leadership group.
“We meet every week or so and one of the biggest things is that elite teams are led by the players, held accountable by the players. Good teams, they’re led by the coaches, held accountable by the coaches. And the poor teams, there’s nobody that does that. We’ve been trying to be the elite team. So we’ve been having a lot of players step up into leadership roles, be more commanding, have a voice. But to have that, you have to work. And when you’re working hard, you build loyalty, you build trust, and then you have those moments where you can speak up, hold your other teammates accountable.”