It’s already do or die: What to watch when USC plays host to Penn State

The refrain felt frustratingly familiar. Here again, in the wake of another disappointing defeat, was the same rosy message from Lincoln Riley, reassuring the public that USC was really just a few plays, a few stops, a few inches away from where its coach wanted them to be.

It’s all a matter of perspective. Still, however close USC might have come, however “battle-tested” it might now be, the harsh reality is Riley has lost seven of his last 12 as the Trojans coach. That’s equivalent to the worst 12-game stretch of Clay Helton’s tenure as USC’s coach.

With No. 4 Penn State on tap Saturday at the Coliseum, the Trojans now find themselves playing for their College Football Playoff lives in mid-October, with zero room for error.

“I promise you,” Riley said this week, “we’re still a very confident team. This isn’t some team that has two losses where we got our ass kicked. No, that’s not the case. We know what we’re capable of.”

Miller Moss had a lot of time to consider that subject on the long flight home from Minneapolis on Oct. 5.

“The most important thing for us right now,” the quarterback said, “is everything we stood for, we worked for, all the messages we said to the team that said what we were about, when you face adversity like this, that’s when that gets tested the most.”

Coming up, against Penn State this weekend, is that fork-in-the-road moment.

“We have two pretty clear choices,” Moss continued. “Double down on who we are and get closer as a team and go forward with the great opportunity we have this weekend, or let this affect us and deter us from what we ultimately want to do.”

We should, by Saturday night, have a much better idea which path the Trojans have chosen.

Rundown run defense

It was the classic Big Ten blueprint. Run the ball. Limit possessions. Grind the clock. But for USC against Minnesota, there was little its defense could do to stop it. The Golden Gophers piled up 193 rushing yards and three touchdowns in 40 carries, nine of which came on the final game-winning drive.

It was strikingly similar to what worked for Michigan against USC two weeks earlier. With an even more potent rushing attack to face this weekend, no reason to think Penn State won’t follow the same plan.

Penn State comes into Saturday as the second-most run-heavy offense in the Big Ten — 40 attempts per game — with a pair of running backs in Nicholas Singleton and Kaytron Allen that both rank among the best in the conference. Singleton, especially, has been electric this season, picking up nearly eight yards per carry.

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“Probably the best two we’ll see so far,” linebacker Easton Mascarenas-Arnold said of the two backs.

It’s not like things have gone well so far for USC’s run defense. The Trojans rank 17th in the conference in rush defense, at a clip of more than 158 yards allowed per game. That’s nearly a 30-yard improvement from last season’s unit. In the Big Ten, however, where teams are content to play “keep away” from USC, it’s not good enough.

Making matters more difficult, USC once again won’t have Eric Gentry, its leader in tackles for lost yardage and sacks.

Big-play Zachariah Branch?

Big plays always have been an essential part of Riley’s offense but they haven’t been quite as easy to come by as usual this season for Moss and Co.

USC ranks 71st in the nation in explosive plays of 20 yards or more, far below the usual range for a Riley-led offense. Before this year, Riley’s offenses at USC and Oklahoma had finished outside of the top 10 one time. The last two seasons, USC ranked in the top four.

A quiet start to the season from Zachariah Branch, the Trojans’ most dynamic open-field weapon, hasn’t helped in that regard. Branch has been limited to 54 combined yards receiving over the last two weeks. He also has made a few costly mistakes in the process, such as muffing a punt against Wisconsin and dropping a key third-down pass against Minnesota.

Read more: Lincoln Riley still thinks USC can be ‘a really good team’ despite loss to Minnesota

Riley acknowledged Monday that Branch was “pressing a little bit,” but “was on the cusp of a few more” big plays.

Penn State boasts one of the best defenses at limiting explosive plays in the country, with just 43 plays of 10-plus yards allowed this season, good for fourth best in college football.

It’d be an ideal time for Branch to break out of his slump. Moss is not about to stop trying.

“My message to him is I’m going to keep getting him the ball,” Moss said. “He’s going to keep getting the ball in those situations, and he’s going to keep making those plays.”

Pressure party

When D’Anton Lynn took over UCLA’s defense in 2023, he didn’t have to worry much about creating pressure. He had Laiatu Latu, a future first-round NFL draft pick, screaming off the edge. Or the Murphy twins, wreaking havoc.

Lynn hasn’t seen anywhere near the same pass-rushing success at USC. The Trojans rank last among18 Big Ten teams in pressures (45) this season.

Penn State, by comparison, has pressured quarterbacks more than twice as much (100). It also boasts one of the best pass rushers in college football in Abdul Carter, who has the same number of pressures through five games (16) as USC’s starting defensive line.

Lynn said he has continued to emphasize generating more pressure “every week.” But at this point, it’s just a matter of players “developing into pass rushers.”

“I think they’ve gotten better,” Lynn said. “And then, from a schematic standpoint, how can we put them in the best positions to succeed?”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.