Can Lincoln Riley, USC take step forward in Year One in Big Ten?

Walking around Big Ten Media Days last month, Lincoln Riley was not oozing confidence. 

Roughly 32 months after he left Oklahoma for the West Coast, he openly discussed the “rebuild” of USC. The NIL structure for the Trojans is good, but he repeatedly talked about still needing to “catch up.” In a year where recruiting wins and development could show if the third-year coach is capable of leading the Trojans back to the top of college football, he made sure expectations were not sky-high.

“We are playing catch up,” the third-year head coach said. “We’re playing catch up in facilities. We’re playing catch up in NIL; we’re playing catch up in resources within the program. We’ve been playing catch up in damn near every way you can think.”

Riley was brought to Los Angeles to turn around a program that had not reached double-digit wins since 2017. He did that in Year One, in part to Caleb Williams’ Heisman Trophy season. A win over Utah in the 2022 Pac-12 title game would have sealed a berth in the four-team College Football Playoff.

The conference title drought is seven years old, and USC has to navigate a Big Ten schedule for the first time. Utah State is the only true buy game on the schedule. The Trojans head to Las Vegas for a Week One matchup with LSU. Big Ten matchups include Michigan, Wisconsin, Penn State, Washington and Nebraska. They close out the year with Notre Dame visiting LA Memorial Coliseum.

How do the Trojans take a step forward while facing one of the toughest schedules in the sport in 2024? That’s the question that will define USC.

“People around the program before probably have a greater respect for that than the ones that just see USC out from a distance,” said Riley, citing his first two years in Los Angeles. “But we’re coming, we’re coming quickly.”

Can USC defense turn corner with D’Anton Lynn

Just how fast is quick?

USC closed the 2023 season dropping five of its last seven games after starting 6-0. Lincoln Riley had to cut ties with his longtime defensive coordinator, Alex Grinch, with two games remaining. The defense finished the year allowing 34.4 points and 433 yards per game.

Riley hit reset on the defensive side of the ball and looked across town, hiring UCLA’s D’Anton Lynn. He brought over the top two defensive backs on the Bruins’ roster, adding John Humphrey and Kamari Ramsey.

The Trojans also landed a handful of playmakers from Oregon State. Safety Akili Arnold will be an immediate contributor, coming off a 2023 season with two interceptions and 60 tackles in 2023. The Beavers’ top tackler a year ago was Easton Mascarenas-Arnold. The linebacker will be a key piece in turning around the USC defense.

Did Riley and Lynn bring in enough talent to revamp a defense to stop Big Ten offenses? Possibly the biggest offseason win for USC was keeping defensive tackle Bear Alexander, who flirted with the portal.

Lynn’s track record gives Riley faith a quick turnaround can happen. UCLA ranked eighth nationally last year, allowing only 4.55 yards per play.

“He obviously authored the biggest turnaround in defensive college football last year, and I got a front-row seat at it,” Riley said. “I thought the changes he made there were staggering.”

USC operating with $10 to $12 million NIL budget

Despite the optimism on the defensive side of the ball, he couched expectations throughout Big Ten media days. While the Trojans enter a conference that boasts top NIL collectives at Oregon and Ohio State, Riley did not try to say USC’s House of Victory collective was competing with them.

He called the organization the “most improved collective in the country.” USC will be operating on a budget between $10 to $12 million this season, a source told On3. The collective has taken steps to align with the administration since athletic director Jennifer Cohen arrived.

The most recent move came last week, when Jeff McKay, the grandson of former USC coach John McKay who won four national titles with the Trojans, joined House of Victory’s board. With the move, his Conquest Collective is shutting down.

“I’m not a magician,” Riley said in Indianapolis. “I can’t wave a magic wand and everything is just perfect right away. But find one area that we haven’t made progress. This thing’s got momentum. It’s coming, nothing’s going to stop it. That’s fine. They started at a different point. We’ll see where it ends up.”

Can Lincoln Riley return to CFP?

For the first time in his career, a team led by Riley is not picked to win the conference. The Trojans did not receive a single first-place vote in the annual Cleveland.com Preseason Big Ten Football Poll. They were picked to finish No. 6 in the 18-team league.

The 40-year-old head coach will be rolling with one of his most unproven quarterbacks to date, too. Miller Moss broke out in the Holiday Bowl last season, throwing for 372 yards and six touchdowns. Week One against LSU will be the first test to see if he’s good enough to get USC into the national title conversation.

Lincoln Riley last made the College Football Playoff in 2019. Will he return during his time at USC?

“We didn’t take over [a program] that was a national championship contender and just walk into it,” he said. “This was a revamp, and this has been a rebuild from a roster standpoint.”