Musings from Arledge: Sizing up this edition of the USC Trojans

I appreciate this USC team. 

What we saw yesterday wasn’t always good. But these guys play hard, they play with guts, and even when mistakes cost USC a very winnable game—like yesterday—I find it impossible not to really like this group. 

USC showed against LSU that they won’t back down to bullies and they’ll fight, even when the odds are long. Yesterday, they did again. Down 14-0 at a packed Big House against a storied opponent, with the offense looking as bad as anything we’ve seen in some years, USC dug deep and started to climb out of the hole, one inch at a time. By late in the fourth quarter, USC had completely turned things around and was in control of the game. That’s a major sign of character, and while late mistakes cost USC the game they don’t erase that this group passed a major gut check.

Everybody wondered what USC would have this year with the new defensive staff and no Caleb Williams. I think we have a pretty good idea now. 

There were two huge questions. The first was whether the defensive line could hold its own against good offensive lines. The answer is yes. Up front defensively, USC doesn’t have a bunch of elite talents who will be high NFL draft choices. They have a large group of overachievers, guys who were going to transfer from USC because they were buried on the depth chart, guys who came in from football-irrelevant programs like Vanderbilt and Wyoming, guys who have been injured almost every year and are hoping to stay healthy for one last go-around. These are guys who worked very hard to get bigger and stronger, guys who are coached very well, guys that give great effort.

Unlike Michigan, USC doesn’t have any play destroyers up front. It doesn’t have a Mike Patterson or Sed Ellis who is going to wreak havoc in the backfield. Everyone hoped that Bear Alexander would take a huge jump and become that guy. It hasn’t happened yet, and maybe it won’t. But he and his overachieving teammates are willing to show up to a fist fight and give as much as they get. To be a real title contender, USC will have to upgrade the talent level of its defensive line. But in the meantime, I love these guys. 

The second question was whether the offensive line could hold up against good teams, especially at tackle. We now know the answer to that question, too. It’s not the answer we wanted. The interior guys struggled with Michigan’s star defensive tackles. But those Michigan guys are really good, and our interior guys fought. The real damage took place on the outside, where we witnessed a bloodbath. USC’s tackles made Josaiah Stewart look like Lawrence Taylor playing against the JV’s. It was such a mismatch that if the teams had been playing under weird touch-football rules where an offensive lineman just needs to touch a defender to take him out of the play, Stewart still would have dominated the game. It was about as ugly as these things get. 

And the coaching staff didn’t help. Long after it became clear that USC needed a RB or TE to help the tackles, USC was still pretending that they could block the edge rushers without help. Lincoln Riley took responsibility for the lost opportunity to finish the game on offense late in the fourth. That was good to see. But the poor effort by the offensive staff didn’t start in the fourth quarter.  

USC will still score points against most of the teams on this schedule. Even yesterday they fought their way to 24 despite being completely overmatched at tackle and despite Riley’s highly questionable play calling for much of the game. But in year three of Riley’s tenure, USC should at least be able to compete with good edge rushers. The inability to recruit elite offensive linemen, the inability to pull a tackle out of the portal, and the inability to coach up the guys they have—remember, Elijah Paige was a big-time recruit—and protect them with scheme and play calling is becoming a major problem. I know Riley isn’t great when it comes to accountability with his staff, but if he’s getting elite production from his offensive line coach, it’s not obvious on Saturday afternoons in year three. This is something to watch going forward. 

Let’s talk about Miller Moss, who almost got killed yesterday. I don’t know if he’ll have PTSD over this, but I think some counseling might be in order. Moss isn’t yet an elite quarterback. He doesn’t have the ability to beat teams with his legs, and he still isn’t a killer from the pocket. A pick-six and a near pick-six in four games isn’t great, and he’s come close to doing it on a couple of other occasions. 

He’s not yet elite. But he’s good, and maybe more importantly, he’s a tough SOB. He stood in there play after play yesterday trying to make plays downfield even knowing that his offensive line could not protect him. The results weren’t great; once you take sacks into account, USC was well below five yards per pass attempt and gave up six points. Those are ugly numbers. But hats off to Miller Moss, who played with guts. 

The offense is going to take the bulk of the blame for this loss, and rightly so. As for the defense, this was a strange game, which essentially came down to three plays, each of which followed the same pattern: an unblocked linebacker couldn’t make the play, and a safety took a bad angle that turned what should have been a 10-yard gain into a dagger to the heart. (And the third of the long runs also featured a return of untimely and devastating missed tackles in the secondary.)

The defense plays hard. I believed before the season that this group had enough talent to be a top-30 defense, and I think that’s been proven true. Yesterday’s defensive performance was not great. Great defensive performances don’t involve 291 rushing yards, and they don’t feature a devastating 63-yard run that gives away a game that was effectively won. But I appreciate how hard that defense plays. Twice in three games the opposing team wanted to turn the game into a prison brawl. And USC’s defense has shown up, stood toe-to-toe, and landed its blows both times. I’ll take that, mistakes and all.

Let’s not forget what a momentous change this is. USC’s defense has been bad for the better part of a decade, and the last three years were unwatchable. Guys couldn’t line up, they didn’t know their assignments, they didn’t play disciplined, they didn’t tackle, and some of the time, it looked like they didn’t care. That’s all gone. I love the way these guys scrap. I love the way they hit. I love that they leave it all on the field. This defense isn’t Georgia’s. It’s not Pete Carroll’s defense from 2008. But these guys play like they know what a privilege it is to wear that uniform. Count me a fan.

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A couple of additional shoutouts. Eddie Czaplicki is a stud, and Michael Lantz’s kickoffs are money. That’s huge. 

Woody Marks’ strip after the sack fumble was incredible. If USC had won, that play goes down in the annals of Trojan lore as the miracle strip that beat Michigan. The loss takes away a lot of that, but it’s still something we shouldn’t forget. 

Eric Gentry is a football player. I don’t care what he looks like. That’s a guy you want in your foxhole. 

It feels good to have a solid defensive staff again. To turn around a completely dysfunctional culture this quickly is a great sign. Those coaches looked great on paper. They’re every bit as good as I had hoped. The future of the USC defense is bright.

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So where does this leave us? 

This is a flawed team. USC has some tough, hardworking guys in its front seven, but it doesn’t have monsters. This isn’t Sed Ellis, Rey Rey, and Cushing. They can’t dominate good teams with overwhelming talent, and they won’t be able to win games solo. And USC has major problems up front offensively. There are defensive coordinators for every team remaining on the schedule that now believe they have a shot to shut down the prolific USC offense. Lincoln Riley and Josh Henson better find a solution and quickly.

But let’s not go overboard. That was a tough loss yesterday because the game was won. Michigan never should have gone 89 yards without a passing game after having been shut down for the entire half. All losses hurt. And it hurts bad to lose a road game against a blue blood that you had. 

But this loss wasn’t devastating. Everything this team could reasonably play for is still available. This is not a national-championship team, and that was never a realistic goal for this roster. But 10-2 and a playoff berth is still within reach. USC will be a big favorite in seven of the remaining nine games, and the other two are at home and winnable. And, fortunately, the pollsters didn’t punish USC for the loss. An excellent season is still within reach. 

Fight On.