Lincoln Riley Preaches 'Play Like You Practice'
If USC head coach Lincoln Riley gets his way, there won’t be any let-up between the start of fall camp and the final time the Trojans take the field this season.
This week represented a shift in the practice schedule for this 2022 USC team. Last Saturday marked the final day of fall camp. This week, the Trojans moved into a mock game-week schedule. It’s the schedule USC will keep throughout the season, barring a small shift for the Friday game against Colorado on Nov. 11.
Even though the season is closing in, Riley wants to see the same attitude and physicality on the practice field the Trojans brought throughout fall camp.
“The big thing we’re pushing on the guys right now is, the game week practices are not like a save it up and gear up for the game,” Riley said following Tuesday’s practice. “We intend to practice out here, especially on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, the way we expect to play on Saturdays…The mentality of this was not a conserve and survive and just make it to Saturday.”
This dovetails with Riley’s assurance previously that position battles will continue throughout the season. Someone who starts the year on the scout team has every right to play his way into the starting lineup later in the year. And that starts on the practice field.
The biggest difference between this week and fall camp is the introduction of the scout team. During camp, the Trojans spent a lot of the time in scrimmage situations with the first team offense going against the first team defense. Now, the offense and defense will work against players simulating Rice and future opponents.
“It’s always a little bit different when you’re going a lot of ones-on-ones and good-on-good in fall camp and you start to transition to learning to practice against scout teams and learning to see different looks,” Riley said. “I think guys, for me most part, it’s been pretty positive.”
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Riley said there were “some things that we weren’t as happy about yesterday,” in talking about Monday’s practice. But the team responded well to its first Tuesday practice in this setting.
Still, Riley and his staff will look to keep the pedal pressed to the floor this season. There is a lot riding on how the Trojans do this year and setting the tone in practice is key.
“You play like you practice,” Riley said. “So we expect these practices to be intense, physical. We’re going to push them mentally and I thought they responded pretty good here on our first Tuesday.
You play like you practice. So we expect these practices to be intense, physical. We’re going to push them mentally and I thought they responded pretty good here on our first Tuesday.
