Outside the Box is a USC football column that looks beyond the stat sheet and box score to trace larger trends and tell more complex sports stories.
Take a look at USC football’s box score the last two weeks and it’s like the Trojans are back to their glory days.
USC’s 755 total offensive yards in its 59-20 win on Saturday against Georgia Southern is its most in two decades.
Last week, USC demolished Missouri State 73-13 in its FBS debut, scoring its most points since 1930.
Reread the names of the two teams USC faced and you can understand why the scores ended up the way they did.
Only Georgia Southern might ring a bell with Trojans fans because former USC head coach Clay Helton is now at the helm, with his Coliseum homecoming souring quickly. For Helton, it seems like no love has been lost.
“He and his family are great and they made some major contributions to this place,” Riley said. “That’s somebody that loves this place and is passionate about it. I just want him to know that he’s appreciated by our football program.”
Helton and Riley’s early tenures are strikingly similar. Riley started off his USC tenure with a 28-14 record while Helton went 26-16 after his interim status became full time.
The difference, however, is that Helton won a Rose Bowl and a Pac-12 championship during that stretch, while Riley has yet to win a team award while in Los Angeles.
Riley needs this team to be successful if he wants the rest of his time at USC to live up to expectations, especially considering the No. 1 recruiting class is supposed to arrive next season – but everyone knows how quickly that can change.
However, he knows what these games can do for his team.
“It’s great for locker room morale because like I said last week, there’s so many people that need to contribute on a week to week basis to get a football team ready to play at a high level,” Riley said. “The general public doesn’t see a lot of that.”
Sure, playing Missouri State and Georgia Southern is a morale boost and gives some younger guys experience, but not many questions have been answered when the starting lineup is in for either half the game or a little over that.
The questions remain on defense after Georgia Southern had a much better offensive performance against USC than it did in its 42-14 beatdown by Fresno State, almost doubling its offense in terms of total yards.
USC was also extremely undisciplined, allowing eight penalties with most of them being charged to the defense. There were also some miscommunications that led to a few wide open touchdowns for Georgia Southern including a broken coverage by redshirt senior Bishop Fitzgerald.
One thing, however, is certain about this USC team: its offense will be its strong point. Redshirt junior quarterback Jayden Maiava looks much more relaxed in the pocket compared to last year, throwing for a new career high 412 yards Saturday night.
He didn’t have to do much though, because he might have the best wide receiver duo in the country in juniors Makai Lemon and Ja’Kobi Lane.
They’re two completely different receivers, but they play off each other so well. The 5′11” Lemon had four receptions for 158 yards, showcasing his speed on a 62-yard touchdown reception and 74-yard touchdown reception when he broke away from the defense on short passes both times.
Lane meanwhile might’ve made the best catch of the early season, bringing in a one-hand grab with his right arm for a touchdown while his left arm was being dragged down to go along with the 91 yards.
“It’s the constant repetition of catching the ball helps,” Lane said about how he’s able to stay focused during plays where there’s contact before the catch. “It’s just being able to recognize where I’m at on the field and the position I’m in to make any play I can.”
USC’s running back room might be the best so far in the Lincoln Riley era according to him. So far, they’ve been almost unstoppable with junior running back Waymond Jordan compiling 167 yards and a touchdown, redshirt senior running back Eli Sanders scoring twice and redshirt freshman running back King Miller contributing 18.3 yards a carry during Saturday’s game.
Those positional groups, combined with redshirt senior tight end Lake McRee, sophomore tight end Walker Lyons and a steady offensive line so far can really make it hard for other teams to compete with.
Or perhaps it’s all just helium from playing two lesser known schools. It seems the players have bought into the culture this year, ditching the flashy pregame outfits of the past and opting for an all-black team issued outfit.
The players seem like a united front, but the test is if Riley and his coaching staff are ready for the upcoming grueling stretch of USC’s schedule. They have to see three currently ranked teams in a row starting at the end of the month – No. 11 Illinois, No. 15 Michigan and No. 9 Notre Dame.