Ultimately, the story of this USC recruiting class, when the dust settles mostly in early December and then for good in February, will be the ones that got away.

A list that unfortunately continues to grow as the early signing period (Dec. 4-6) nears.

In the last two days alone, USC has seen two of its top defensive commits flip to other schools -- first four-star defensive end Hayden Lowe (a local prospect from Oaks Christian HS who flipped to Miami on Wednesday) and then four-star Rivals250 cornerback Shamar Arnoux (the No. 122nd-ranked recruit nationally, from Georgia, who flipped to Auburn on Thursday).

USC's 2025 recruiting class has dropped from 10th to 13th in the Rivals rankings, but attrition may not be done yet as five-star quarterback Julian Lewis continues to consider Colorado and Georgia (including a high-profile visit to Athens this weekend) and four-star offensive tackle Carde Smith also continues to look strongly at the Buffaloes after a recent visit to Boulder.

"It's certainly a tough time -- I don't think there's any way around that," Rivals national recruiting director Adam Gorney said. "Hayden Lowe was sort of an NIL play for Miami -- unlimited funds basically down there -- but they're also playing really, really well, so I think those two things in combination certainly had him flipped. And then Shamar Arnoux was always going to be a wildcard. ... [I] always felt that Auburn or Miami or Georgia was going to be involved there. Hayden Lowe was much more of a NIL play.

"So in the business that we're now in -- which is win or people leave, or pay them or people leave -- USC is losing that game a little bit right now on both fronts. And then, yeah, there's certainly another piece of this puzzle with JuJu Lewis to watch as that kind of goes through this weekend and beyond."

It also bears remembering that USC had already endured decommitments earlier in this cycle from five-star defensive tackle Justus Terry (the No. 8-ranked recruit nationally), five-star safety Hylton Stubbs (No. 20) and four-star defensive end Isaiah Gibson (No. 60).

Riley was asked generally on Thursday -- not specific to Lowe's situation or any other -- about the state of NIL bidding wars that are fueling the run of decommitments and flips nationally right now.

He was pretty candid about the challenge it adds to the whole recruiting process.

"That's absolutely going on. And the hard thing right now is you're living in a world where you don't even necessarily know everything out there, like what's true and what's not," Riley said. "A kid says, 'Well, I was offered this.' You have no way of verifying that. You have no way to know if it's true. We've had examples where it probably is true, we've had plenty where we've found out that was not true at all. ...

"We've talked long about is there some sort of situation where schools would be required to share publicly what their offer is to a kid to eliminate some of the smoke and mirrors and all that that is going on. Because there's so much of that right now. We're kind of all living in the in-between right now, and that's what it is and you've got to understand it, you've got to embrace it. You can't get too high or too low about it. You've just got to keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep making the next best decision you can for your place, and that's been the mentality we've tried to create with it."

Aside from Lewis, USC has just one other Rivasl100 commit in wide receiver Jerome Myles (No. 99, from Draper, Utah), with linebacker Matai Tagoa'i (No. 104, from San Clemente HS) and wide receiver Corey Simms (No. 108, from St. Louis) just outside the top 100.

Overall, USC has eight Rivals250 commits, including four-star linebackers Ty Jackson (No. 205, from Loxahatchee, Florida) and Jadon Perlotte (No. 214, from Buford, Georgia), four-star safety Kendarius Reddick (No. 224, from Thomasville, Georgia) and four-star defensive end Gus Cordova (No. 233, from Austin, Texas).

But just as the Trojans may not be able to hold onto all their current commits, they also aren't done pursuing other targets over these next few weeks.

The fact that USC is mired in a disappointing 4-5 season certainly hasn't helped on the recruiting front, though.

"I think you just call it like it is. The recruits that understand and see, I think they do see the progress and they do see how close this team is. And the real elite competitors look at it and say, 'Gosh, this team's been that close, and if our class can come in here and add a boost to this and make this better, we can be the ones to help this thing over the edge,'" Riley said. "I think the great ones always see the opportunity, and I do think recruiting in general, especially when you have a year like ours that hasn't obviously went the way that we wanted in the last several weeks, you find out pretty quickly who's about that and who's really able to take on the head-on challenge. And I think, honestly, I haven't been through many years like this, but at times like this it's sometimes even easier to evaluate who's all in with you. Which can be, with all the different things happening in the world of recruiting with college football right now can maybe sometimes be a little bit tougher to discern between that. I think the real ones see exactly what we're doing and are very committed to it.

"I think we're all in a time now with this early, early signing period that a lot of volatility that we're used to seeing in maybe mid-December the last few years is going to start happening and you're seeing it happen all over the country. We're going to stay steady, stay the course. We know the kind of people and players we want to bring in here, and that's what we're going to keep doing."

Two weeks ago Riley said there was still "an addition or two I think left -- potentially on the offensive and defensive fronts ... but we’re certainly pretty close to the end there.”

Alas, as the decommitments pile up that remains a moving target.

Here's an in-depth look at USC's current crop of 21 commits and the key remaining targets still in play, with insight from our Rivals analysts.

*Recruited as a linebacker.

*Recruited as a center

*Two-way player most likely to start out at DB but with potential to play WR and return kicks.

The buzz surrounding a potential flip from USC’s five-star quarterback commit has only continued to intensify in the final stages of the recruiting cycle ahead of the early signing period. He has continued to take visits to programs such as Indiana and Colorado while Georgia is hosting him this weekend for another visit as the Bulldogs move firmly back into the picture. USC has had Lewis out to multiple games this season, but the momentum seems to be trending away from the Trojans as it stands now.

Rivals national recruiting director Adam Gorney's take:

"It's sort of an hour-by-hour thing. He remains committed. He's been committed for over a year. Would I be absolutely, totally shocked if he came out of this weekend and Georgia was the new leader and it looked like he was going there? A lot of people in Georgia felt that he would eventually have flipped to Georgia, then they took Ryan Montgomery so that never happened. And now they're definitely in the workings for a second quarterback. I think it's almost a virtual guarantee that they're going to take a second one. Jaron Sagapolutele is visiting next weekend. I think he kind of wants his own time there. They're going after KaMario Taylor, the Mississippi State commit. He's definitely intrigued. And JuJu doesn't essentially live right down the road -- it's still a little over two hours away -- but it's certainly closer than jumping on a plane for five hours. So I think JuJu is struggling with this.

"Lincoln Riley, even though this season has been a wild disappointment, still has developed No. 1 draft picks and Heisman Trophy winners. Does he want to trade that for Colorado, which no one knows what it's going to look like after this season -- obviously having a phenomenal season but Shedeur [Sanders], Shilo [Sanders] and Travis Hunter are gone, can [Deion Sanders] rebuild that quickly enough to make them a competitor? Does he have any interest in staying long enough to make them a competitor, continue to be a competitor? And then there's Georgia. You probably think Kirby Smart stays there forever. You probably think they're a top-5 team forever. And it's right down the road and it's the SEC and after this season when Carson Beck goes to the NFL it's a very open quarterback competition there.

"So all of those sort of things are playing a factor. It certainly helps USC that the defense has played better this season. It certainly doesn't help them that they go to Minnesota and Maryland and lose games. That is just incredibly bad. So I think you factor all of those things in it and who knows how this plays out. I've gotten no read from Julian, from the family about exactly where things stand. He's going into this visit with Georgia committed to USC. I'm sure there's still a lot NIL play involved here, and that's kind of where it stands right now. ...

"What I've been told is that USC feels they'll be fine at quarterback. That's the word I've been told, so I think everyone is just like, 'All right JuJu, what are you going to do?' And then we'll figure it out from there. If he stays at USC, great, that is ideal, that is plan No. 1."

Deion Sanders’ Buffaloes are involved with a number of USC’s commits, but none of them look more likely to end up calling Boulder home than Smith. The four-star offensive lineman from Alabama has started to drive expert predictions in favor of a flip to Colorado, and that shouldn’t come as a surprise with Sanders and his staff turning up the heat in Smith’s recruitment this fall. The one-time Auburn commit eventually picked the Trojans in August, but he has now made multiple trips to Colorado over the course of his senior season including an official visit just a few weeks ago.

Gorney's take:

"He told me in the last couple days -- now there have been a lot of rumors about him flipping to Colorado -- he told me in the last couple days that he's honestly unsure about what he's going to do. I would suspect that Colorado ends up getting him, just having sort of second thoughts about where he stands, but it's definitely not a lock like some people have reported that he's going to flip. He seems genuinely torn between sticking or going to Colorado."