What the USC players are saying about new strength coach Aaron Ausmus

It's impossible to know for sure when it comes to intangible factors -- it's all perception and interpretation at this point -- but that being said, there has been a palpably different tone and vibe around the USC football program since spring practice.

And a lot of that seems to have originated off the field, through the Trojans' spring and now summer strength training programs.

Over the last couple weeks, as the team goes through player-run practices, a handful of guys have elaborated on the specific impact of new strength and conditioning coach Aaron Ausmus and how he's gone about trying to influence what USC hopes is an overall culture change within the program coming off a 5-7 finish.

"Guys have been accountable, people not missing workouts as much, showing up on time, showing up early and competing for the same common purpose," redshirt senior defensive end Christian Rector said. "I'd say the [biggest thing has been the] focus on accountability and knowing it starts with us. It doesn't really matter who our coaches are because they're going to come and go. But amongst the players, he's helped instill that culture of doing it for us because at the end of the day we're the team, we're the ones going out on the field.

"The coaches can coach us up and tell us [what to do] and that's pivotal, but at the end of the day it's on the players. With this training camp, it's really been harping on accountability."

Accountability has been the mandate from head coach Clay Helton after he survived that 5-7 finish last fall and pledged to turn his Trojans into a more disciplined team. That directive was discussed when Helton hired Ausmus prior to the start of spring, to replace former strength coach Ivan Lewis after he left to join the Seattle Seahawks.

Ausmus, who held this same position at USC previously before departing as part of the staff changes following Lane Kiffin's firing in 2013, talked to TrojanSports.com at length back in March about his philosophy in the weight room and the impact he's trying to make.

"There's a lot of strength coaches that can go out and coach squats and make a guy stronger in the bench press, but can a staff create a culture where it's about competing in here and guys want to be on time because there's a pride about it? And want to do their best just because of the pride and sense that this is the standard in our program. So that's our daily task," Ausmus said then.

The players, meanwhile, have shed more light recently on just how he's going about enacting that.

The USC roster has been divided into four teams for the purposes of the summer strength and conditioning program, which started in early June. Those teams are in a competition where they are essentially only as strong as their weakest link, as one player's tardiness or lack of effort/discipline can bring down the collective score.

"Each team is able to earn points throughout the week. Fridays we have competiitons and Mondays we have weigh-ins," Rector explained. "Guys used to fluctuate weight all the time and go out on the weekends and come in overweight or underweight, whatever the case may be. But now you're accountable directly to your team. You want to win.

"If you show up late or miss a workout, it directly affects your team and you want to make sure you're not negatively affecting your team. It's pure numbers. You can see it directly. You kind of [knew] which guys are falling behind in the past, which guys are slacking, but now everybody sees it. There's no hiding it."

As the USC players have been posting their summer team photoshoot pictures recently, followers of the program have noted seeing some obvious physical changes.

Rector, for his part, said he's added 10 pounds to reach his directed goal weight of 275 while not sacrificing any speed or fluidity. Quarterback JT Daniels explained on the Trojan Talk podcast how he reshaped his body this offseason. Offensive tackle Jalen McKenzie also noted the changes he can feel in his body heading into this season while echoing Rector's comments about the emphasis on accountability.

"When they did that it just turned up the level of competition in the strength and conditioning room because everybody's trying to be the best team. Piggy-backing off that, we've just been able to come out here and be more efficient in our PRPs, be more efficient in the weight room. It's just helped a lot," McKenzie said.

"With the teams and everything and the competition, it's created like a bond. Everybody knows and can see who's giving it all, who's not, so after the first week comes it just becomes second nature and it's contagious to go all out. It's contagious to buy into the program, so that made the brotherhood come along because you see all your other brothers going 100 percent, giving it their all. You're not going to look at yourself like, 'OK, I gave 80 percent today.' That doesn't work when you're competing and now your team's losing because coach say you weren't giving it your all. … That's the same way it goes in the game. If you didn't line up, now we lose 10 yards because you lined up wrong, everyone's going to look at you."

As for what's physically different in approach, Ausmus has shifted the focus in the weight room to more power workouts.

Safety Talanoa Hufanga also discussed Ausmus' approach recently on the podcast, noting that players owe 10 pushups anytime they use the term "work out" instead of "strength train" as a way of reiterating that there is a purpose to their time in the weight room.

Ausmus explained that the foundation of everything the Trojans do now in there is driven by a pyramid approach were the base is strength foundation and the second tier is power production.

"All athletes if you ask them, 'What do you want to work on?' [They'll say], 'Oh, my speed, coach, I've got to get fast.' … Our speed program is really built on being strong, being powerful -- which will support that speed," Ausmus explained.

Said Rector: "It's more power lifting. We used to do more functional movement, single-leg stuff. And now it's just like pull, press, clean, Olympic lifts. People's backs are getting bigger, people's necks -- we're doing neck exercises. You can definitely see it, people's chests starting to poke out a little bit more."

For a USC team that seemed overmatched up front at times by more physical opponents last fall -- the blowout loss at Utah comes to mind -- what may encourage fans the most are the comments coming from the offensive linemen.

"We've gotten a lot stronger. That's just the facts of it," McKenzie said. "… This strength and conditioning program didn't start this summer, it didn't at all. Right after spring ball ended, that was the start of our program, so we've been laying the foundation since then and slowly been increasing. ... You know you're getting stronger because you couldn't do [what you're doing] two weeks ago."

Said center Brett Neilon: "We’ve been lifting heavy and lifting hard. I think he puts an emphasis on eating -- eating thick as an O-line. He likes when we post Snapchats of our steak and send him the food. 'Lift heavy, eat thick.'"

McKenzie noted that Neilon is one of the strongest players on the team and joked that if he wasn't playing football he'd "be doing strongman competitions and pulling stuff."

Neilon, is viewed as the favorite to win the center job, while fellow redshirt sophomore McKenzie is competing for the starting right tackle job. USC will have three new starters on the offensive line in all, but more importantly the Trojans are hoping for a new identity up front.

For as much as any position group, the hope is that the strength program will indeed prove to be a tone-setter for the linemen on both sides.

"You have a sense of pride in what you're doing because you know what you're doing it for and you know the results you're going to get, so it just makes you want to buy in even more," McKenzie said. "At home you're thinking about, oh, am I going to make weight for my team when I come in on Monday, so I'm not going to eat this or I'm going to go do this. I know I have to make this. That's been the biggest thing, the accountability of it and the increments of us feeling ourselves getting better. I don't know if you guys see it, but you can see it with guys, a bunch of skill guys are getting more proud of their bodies and really taking in the self-pride of it. …

"Across the board, the standard's been set and everybody's trying to meet the standard and not meeting the standard is unacceptable."

Back in the spring, not long after Ausmus had taken over and started making his imprint on the strength program, redshirt freshman running back Markese Stepp commented on the change in intensity within the weight room.

"Man, it was a rude awakening the first two weeks. It was a very rude awakening -- something you definitely have to get used to," he said then. "He's very intense, very upbeat, moving fast. There's no lollygagging. He's going to get us back to dominance."

The players refer to Ausmus as Double-A and all indications are they have taken quickly to his ways and his personality.

"I love that guy. He brings a fire every day and it’s something that I haven’t experienced with that much consistency since I’ve been here," veteran reserve QB Matt Fink said last week.

Going back to the summer competition between the four squads within the USC roster, Fink had another interesting observation.

"The meshing of both sides of the ball is a huge factor, I think, for his program. He has teams split up so that it isn’t just offense versus defense," he said. "... He’s made it so not only are we building a camaraderie and brotherhood through all sides of the ball, but we’re also competing and we’re also getting better every single day because of it."

The Trojans, of course, still have to prove that this level of discipline and buy-in and camaraderie and all of those nice-sounding intangibles also have a tangible carryover to Saturdays in the fall.

But the comments emanating from the summer PRPs are no doubt a welcome change of narrative for a team that was highly penalized last year and clearly had buy-in issues, which then-senior linebacker Cam Smith spoke candidly about after the season finale.

"It's doing the little things and that's what creates the big difference in games. That's how you go 5-7 is not doing the little things correctly," Rector said.