USC coach Lincoln Riley talked with media after practice Tuesday as USC works through its bye week.
Riley shared more takeaways from the win over Stanford, talked about the progress of the secondary and other matters.
Watch the full interview here and scroll down for a complete transcript of his comments
Who made most of extra snaps in second half?
“Duce continues to do some really good things. I thought Miller played really well. Was definitely proud of the way he played. Couple of the young linemen played well, and we had a few breakdowns in there, but a couple of guys came in there and played pretty well. Miller played well, Elijah Banes played well, Michael Banuelos. Couple of guys took advantage of it, certainly from that side. Defensively, we didn’t probably rotate quite as heavy there, but still, certainly, some guys showed up that – those reps are just so valuable, those game reps are just so valuable. It’s been awesome – three weeks in, we’ve been able to play as many guys as we have. I think the majority of guys have taken advantage of ‘em, whether it’s been Elijah Hughes, Braylan Shelby, Raesjon kinda got his deal there, and then obviously more opportunities came up, and he was ready for ‘em when they showed up. I think in large part, been pleased with how we’ve handled those situations.”
Does this team have chance to be best they’ve ever coached?
“I don’t get too much into that. I like our team. We got a long, long ways to go. I’ve been lucky enough, had a chance to coach some pretty good teams. And this team has a chance to be a very good team, but we’re three games in, we’re one conference game in with a lot of things we haven’t done yet that we’re getting opportunities to do so. We’ll get our chance, just like we have every year. If we are, then we’ll prove it here in the next couple months, and that will get proven about what happens on the field.”
What did the film show from the first half against Stanford?
“We did play well, we played well on all three sides. But we did a lot of good things on all three sides. But still, some of the penalties just make you want to pull your hair out. We just had some really careless penalties – we still had a few busts on all sides that showed up. Now, I thought we played hard, I thought we played really fast and aggressive, and I thought that covered up, at times, some of the mistakes. So sometimes, you go make a play and it’s just really good football and it’s not a whole lot you would correct off of it. Sometimes, you make a play but you busted something, or you did something wrong, and it’s great you’re still able to make the play, but you’re not gonna be able to consistently do that what the errors were. And so, there was a lot of that throughout the game, right. There was a lot of, it’s good, but if the results of the game and the scoreboard blinds us from areas that we need to get better at, then, you know, we won’t take it the way that we should. Which, excited about the good, but a lot of bad things that need to get fixed.”
Is there anyone you hope to get more touches moving forward?
"Not in particular. That has its ebbs and flows. The guys that are playing the best, the ball is going to find them. The guys that are playing the most reps, the ball is going to find them. It’s going to be different guys in different weeks. As long as we’re producing, moving the ball, helping the team win that’s all we care about."
What's your evaluation of the secondary?
"We’ve improved. We gave up a couple of plays in the first game that we felt like we weren’t in the position that we needed to be in. I felt like the last two weeks, we’ve really improved a lot. Coverage has been tight, we’ve had a lot of PBUs, we’ve had obviously the interception last week, so yeah, I think we’ve taken some good steps. I think some guys have started to get settled in. We’ve had some less mental mistakes, l think we’re played some pretty clean ball really there the last couple of weeks, so that’s really good to see."
How about Domani Jackson?
"He’s doing well. Domani, you can see the talent and you can see him improving rapidly and then he also has some moments there where you could tell that it’s been a while since he’s been out there playing. So he’s just – he’s on a steep learning curve. He’s learning quickly, he’s getting better. He’s done a good job taking the coaching and he’s going through what all young guys who get a chance to play a lot, maybe early in their careers. Caleb went through this our first year at Oklahoma. It’s just different. You gotta get adjusted and adapted, I think he’s been better as the weeks have gone on and we’re correcting things and he’s been able to make those improvements and I think it’s just going to be a rapid climb."
How do you draw the line between aggressive penalties and careless penalties?
"The careless ones, they’re just careless, it’s a pretty easy line to draw. There’s no room for it. We had too many of those the other night. It can’t happen, good teams don’t do that, good players don’t get dumb penalties. And for us, i told them, it’s really simple, if we get some of the penalties like we did, those guys aren’t going to play. I mean, there’s no player that’s so good that they’re worth that. We’ll get it corrected, l believe this group will. We don’t want to curb their aggression because we are playing pretty aggressive on both sides and that needs to continue and with that, there will be some penalties here or there. Typically and I’ve said this to you all before, you go look at the end of the season, at the least penalized teams, typically they’re all like .500 or below and you look at some of the most penalized teams and some of them are some of the better teams in the country. Because they’re aggressive, but again, they gotta come through aggression and not through carelessness, not through things we can control and get a lot better at so it’s been a big point of emphasis this week and counting on our guys and our coaches to do a better job of it."
