Despite positive defensive performances from freshman defensive end Luke Wafle and others, the Trojans allowed 30 points in their week three 49-30 victory over the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns at the Coliseum. While the offense has been firing on all cylinders, the defense has still yet to play to their best ability.
USC beat San Jose State convincingly, demolished Fresno State – preventing them from scoring – and won on Saturday again versus the University of Louisiana’s Ragin’ Cajuns behind standout performances from freshman tight-end Mark Bowman and freshman wide receiver Trent Mosley. On the other side of the ball, new defensive coordinator Gary Patterson has the Trojan defense playing well with strong individual efforts, but there are still major gaps to address.
Last year, the Trojans were a powerhouse on offense, but their main downfall came on the defense where they faced issues with bigger and more physical teams like Oregon and Notre Dame.
Patterson, the previous TCU head coach, is now tasked with solving that problem. In USC’s first two games, Patterson’s starting unit led by junior defensive tackle Jide Abasiri and star freshman defensive end Luke Wafle allowed only three points until the backups were put in and the defense fell apart.
This week, the defensive line stole the spotlight once again with a stellar start to the game. Although redshirt senior quarterback Jayden Maiava threw an interception on the first drive setting up the Ragin’ Cajuns in Trojan territory, the defense posted a three and out behind key tackles from Wafle and Abasiri.
On the next defensive drive, Wafle continued to make his presence known with a huge tackle for loss on first down. The Trojans would follow that positive play with a joint tackle from redshirt junior linebacker Deven Bryant and redshirt senior linebacker Alex VanSumeren and good coverage on third down to force a second straight punt.
The third defensive drive is where the Trojans showed their holes on defense allowing Louisiana to convert on their only scoring drive of the first half. Although the defensive line and linebacker units have been playing extremely well, USC is still struggling with fine tuning their secondary.
The secondary struggled tremendously on this drive, allowing a 37 yard wide open pass completion down the seam to Louisiana freshman receiver Kristion Brooks who pushed the Ragin’ Cajuns all the way down to the one yard line. Redshirt sophomore running back Steven Blanco did the rest of the work punching it in and making the score 14-10.
Criticizing the secondary might seem harsh, as the Trojans closed out the half leading 28-10, but these are the kinds of mistakes USC can’t afford when they play ranked teams on their schedule in conference play.
Nevertheless, one noticeable difference between last year’s defense and this year’s is that they don’t dwell on their mistakes, they learn from them. On the following drive for Louisiana, Wafle continued his impressive half by adding two more additional tackles to his statline.
Wafle finished with five total tackles to end the half while Abasiri was close behind with four. Junior linebackers Desman Stephens II and Deven Bryant also had three a piece.
When asked about his assessment of the defense Saturday, Wafle noted “I’d say there was a lot of good, but we got to clean up some stuff. It’s good to get this victory under our belt, but we got to keep stacking days and getting better”.
In the second half, the defense picked up where they left off, earning another three and out behind strong tackling, but struggled on the Ragin’ Cajuns next drive.
They stopped Louisiana in the red zone and forced a missed field goal but committed an in-experienced penalty by roughing the kicker, leading to an eventual Louisiana touchdown.
USC’s defense has proven in these first three games the talent they possess along the defensive line and at the linebacker position, however, the secondary continues to struggle. In order to make the college football playoffs, the Trojans will have to clean up their mistakes on the defensive side of the ball.
Head coach Lincoln Riley emphasized the importance of cleaning up these mistakes.
“The penalties are going to be the most alarming thing for us tonight [Saturday],” Riley said. “It was a lot and they were at horrible times [in the game].”
After their away matchup and first in conference play next week against Rutgers, the Trojans will head back home for their biggest matchup of the season thus far against the Oregon Ducks. Their star defensive linemen and their secondary need to step up and minimize the unforced errors.
These first few games offered a confidence boost on both sides of the ball, but Patterson will have his hands full trying to shut down the pass game in conference play.
Edited by Sammie Vassallo and Adriana Brady