Musings from Arledge: Second-Year Turnarounds

Lincoln Riley’s first-year turnaround is one of the great single-season turnarounds in recent college football history, despite the disappointing finish. It wasn’t surprising that USC got better under Riley; the Trojans probably would have gotten better if I were hired, and I know nothing. That’s how far the program had fallen. But it was surprising how quickly the turnaround happened. It’s usually the second season when a good coach sees such a big jump. (These were special circumstances, I know; we’ll discuss that below.)

The rule had plenty of exceptions, but the frequency with which a good coach turns a program around in the second year is too significant to ignore.

Coach	College	Year Before	First Year	Second Year	Notes
Pete Carroll	USC	5-7	6-6	11-2
John McKay	USC	8-2*	4-6	4-5-1*	The team McKay inherited was 8-2 the year before, but the two years before that, USC was dreadful. McKay’s turnaround came in year 3, with an undefeated national championship season
Bob Stoops	Oklahoma	5-6	7-5	13-0
Urban Meyer	Florida	7-5	9-3	13-1
Urban Meyer	Utah	5-6	10-2	12-0
Nick Saban	LSU	3-8	8-4	10-3
Nick Saban	Alabama	6-7	7-6	12-2
Howard Schnellenberger	Miami	6-5	5-6	9-3
Dennis Franchione	Alabama	3-8	7-5	10-3
Bill Snyder	Kansas State	0-11	1-10	5-6
Matt Campbell	Iowa State	3-9	3-9	8-5
Lou Holtz	Notre Dame	5-6	5-6	8-4	Big improvement in year two, but national title in year three
Jim Tressel	Ohio State	8-4	7-5	14-0
Ara Parseghian	Notre Dame	2-7	9-1		Immediate turnaround in year one
Urban Meyer	Ohio State	6-7	12-0	12-2	Meyer took over a team with a bad record, but Ohio State was not a down program. It was 99-17 in the last nine years under Jim Tressel. Tressel’s unexpected firing led to one down season before the team went 83-9 under Meyer.
Brian Kelly	Notre Dame	6-6	8-5	8-5	Went 12-1 in year four
Steve Spurrior	Florida	7-5	9-2	10-2

There are no hard-and-fast rules here. Some of these coaches – like Ara Parseghian at Notre Dame – turned their programs around immediately. Some – like Urban Meyer at Ohio State – really weren’t taking over programs that were down. 

Still, it’s remarkable to see how frequently good coaches turned around blue-chip programs in their second seasons, and even how good coaches of traditional doormat programs showed massive improvement in year two.

Now, Lincoln Riley’s situation is different than a lot of these others, because the transfer portal allowed him to significantly increase his talent base before his first season. Having Caleb Williams join the team will help cover a lot of weaknesses. Faster turnarounds are possible now.

But I’m not convinced the second-year turnaround is primarily about talent. In the old days – before the transfer portal – the second-year recruits are going to be true sophomores, and true sophomores rarely carry a football team to a great bowl game or national title. And the first recruiting class is usually not a dominant one, because the coach did not have an entire cycle to build relationships.

I think the second-year jump is more often the result of program culture. It takes time to fix a broken culture. Pete Carroll told his players that they didn’t have to lose anymore. But it took until the middle of the second season for that reality to sink in and be reflected by consistent play on the field. 

I don’t believe USC will see a massive jump on the offensive side of the ball this year. The offense was too good last year to see that. I think it will be better. I like the offensive line depth more, Caleb Williams will have another year of experience, and Riley has had another year to implement his offense.

The big jump, if it comes, will be defensively. Like many of you, I’m still skeptical of Alex Grinch. But it’s important to note that Grinch did not get the same influx of talent that Riley’s offense did before last season, nor did he get a superstar Heisman winner that could cover up shortcomings in talent and leftover cultural problems. And Grinch inherited a mess, an absolute, shocking, grease fire of a defense. He has better talent now, and he’s had a full year to implement his vision. I don’t know if Grinch has what it takes. But a first-year mulligan isn’t unreasonable, and if he’s truly a solid defensive coordinator, we should see significant improvement this year.

We better. Because it would be a crime to waste Caleb Williams and the 2023 offense. This will be the best group USC has had since 2005. The defense doesn’t have to be amazing, just decent. Please be at least decent.

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Like you, I’ve read the rumors that the Big 10 wants Washington and Oregon. I don’t know whether to believe those reports. And I’ll save my rant until we find out. But if USC agrees to let Oregon join its new conference, somebody should pay with their job.

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If Duce Robinson picks USC, the Trojans could have an all-time great receiver class. Zachariah Branch will play a ton this year, and he will be electric. Makai Lemon might have a tougher time breaking through all of the experienced upperclassmen, but he’s going to be fantastic. And there is room right now for a big receiver, which I think is exactly what Robinson would be with the Trojans. You don’t know how a recruiting class will pan out until a few years later. But it’s hard to imagine a better group of receiving prospects than that.

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It’s also hard to imagine a tougher ending to a schedule than what USC has this year. The first half is a cakewalk; the team will win, and the young guys should get experience. But in the final six games, USC will be at Notre Dame, home against Utah, at Cal (bye week!), home against Washington, at Oregon, and home against UCLA. Holy smokes. Add a conference championship game (I hope) the following week, and add two playoff games after that, and for USC to win a national title, it will likely have to defeat 8 ranked teams in the space of 9 games, and some of those teams will be very highly rated. That’s brutal. It’s almost like the Pac-12 schedulers had something against USC. Weird.