Lincoln Riley offers strong defense of his USC defense

There isn’t a national title contender in college football this season that doesn’t have at least a few questions to answer over the second half of the regular season. But no unit on any top-ten team has received as much scrutiny as the USC defense. ESPN’s Paul Finebaum has seemingly made it a daily ritual to comment on that side of the ball for the Trojans and how it will cost them a shot at a title. Others have referred to the USC defense as a joke.

USC ranks No. 79 in the nation in scoring defense, giving up 2.2 fewer points per game than they did in the 2022 season. USC ranks No. 112 in total defense, allowing 2.6 fewer yards per game than they did in 2022, when the Trojans ranked No. 106 in total defense. The Trojans are allowing just 2.8 fewer rushing yards per game last season. And the Trojans are allowing the same 264 passing yards per game they gave up in 2022.

Virtually all head coaches talk about how they work to keep outside noise and media talking points from getting inside the program and becoming distractions. But we’ve seen more than a few coaches this season directly address comments made by media members or other coaches. USC head coach Lincoln Riley sort of joined that list after practice on Tuesday, launching a full defense of his defense in the face of growing media and fan scrutiny.

“Here’s the deal,” Riley said as part of his response to a question about what media and fans might be missing when disparaging the defense. “Everybody in the media had their mind made up. No, I won’t generalize. A lot of people in the media had their mind made up that the first second there was any adversity, they were just going to say ‘Oh my God. Should have done this. And they should have made this change.’ And blah, blah, blah. And it’s not true. Listen, you’re gonna go through the whole year, you’re gonna have a tough game. You’re gonna have a tough quarter. Do you respond? Do you show continued growth? And that’s going to continue to be written throughout the entire year. But there’s a lot of great things happening here.”

Riley pointed specifically to the sack and tackle for loss numbers the Trojans have posted to this point. USC is tied for No. 6 in the nation in sacks per game and tied for No. 2 in the nation in tackles for loss per game.

“We’ll own the things that need to get better,” Riley said. “But people need to make sure they’re seeing the other side of it as well. And that’s what we’ve been trying to say for a long time.”

The long response from Riley comes a few days after USC’s 43-41 win against Arizona in triple overtime. In the post-game press conference, quarterback Caleb Williams stepped in on a question posed to Riley about the USC defense and gave full praise to that side of the ball for the win, saying it wouldn’t have been possible without them. Riley also reiterated that after the 17-0 deficit USC put themselves in, the defense made the play to get the team back into it and allowed just 11 more points in regulation, which should have ended with a game-winning field goal.

“I think both myself and Caleb and some of our other players, we’re venting a little bit of frustration, to be completely honest,” Riley said. “I like the job we’re doing there. I think we’re set up to play really well the second half of the season. And I can promise you, inside these walls, there is no expectation other than to play high level here the second half of this year.”

Colorado and Arizona are not bad offensive teams. But Washington and Oregon are Nos. 1 and 2 in the nation in yards per game, and even a struggling Notre Dame offense has scored more points per game than both the Buffaloes and Wildcats this season. The real challenges for this USC defense begin now, which is why those statistics are so alarming.

But Riley said he trusts that group to face these challenges head on. They’ll certainly have a chance to prove themselves one way or the other.

“We’re not hiding from the areas that we’ve got to continue to make improvements, and there certainly are some,” he said. “But this is a much-improved unit. There is no question about it. This is a unit, I think, when you talk about the top-end potential, has a chance to really grow and get better fast given some of the youth, some of the new people, some of the quality depth that we have, some of the injuries that we’re had that have prevented guys from being able to continually get snaps.”