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Published Sep 13, 2022
Everything USC coach Lincoln Riley said Tuesday ahead of Fresno State game
Ryan Young  •  TrojanSports
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After practice Tuesday, as No. 7-ranked USC turned its focus to the home game this week against Fresno State, coach Lincoln Riley met with reporters for to update a couple injury situations, discuss takeaways from the win at Stanford and look ahead to the Bulldogs.

Riley talked about the status of rush end Romello Height and left tackle Courtland Ford, why the offense slowed down in the second half Saturday, the process of the players learning to fully trust the system, his thoughts on Fresno State and praise for cornerback Mekhi Blackmon.

Watch the full interview here or scroll through our complete transcript of his comments below:

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What did the film show you that maybe you didn't see live Saturday?

"I think we had a pretty good beat on it during the game. I don't think there was a lot of surprises. A ton of positives, a ton to get better at. The positives, I think, are pretty obvious on all sides. I think the areas we got to get better, there's too many mental mistakes. That first and foremost. And whether it's lack of focus or lack of just complete trust in what we're doing, that's got to grow. And the reality is, I've had players that have been in our system for multiple years and it's still not 100 percent trust. It may get up to like a high 90 and that's good, but we've got room to go there with every player here. Like, you trust it, in spring ball it's not too hard to do it, you can see some of the results in the past and you're excited about it, fall camp and all that, but now all of a sudden you get there on Saturday and find out how ironclad that trust is. Sometimes lack of focus, sometimes lack of trust, but regardless of what it is we've got to get it fixed."

Romello Height was in a sling today, what's the update on him?

"Yeah, we'll evaluate him. He's had a tough shoulder. We're going to give him a little bit of downtime here early in the week and then reevaluate. Just been kind of a lingering shoulder issue, he's had a couple of events on the practice field and the game field that have made it tough to get any momentum in terms of recovering. So we're going to try to let that thing calm down a bit over the next few days and reevaluate, and obviously we'll have some guys step up on the edge in his absence."

How did Solomon Byrd earn the extra reps he got there Saturday?

"He did a good job early in camp. He missed a little bit of time in the middle of camp with not a serious but an injury that held him out for a little bit. And he's kind of been catching back up. It's like several guys on our roster -- he's been doing some good things in practice, he's kind of been coming back along, catching up. And other guys during that time when he was out have obviously passed him up, like anybody's going to do when they're injured, and it's like you've just got to wait to get ready for your opportunity. He's been working. It's funny, I told at the hotel that morning -- obviously I had no idea it was going to happen -- but just, you've got to always be ready, you never know when it is. And he was ready. He got in there, got reps, played aggressive, got after the passer, played fast and it was obviously important for that he stepped up and he did."

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