Fans have criticized the redshirt junior quarterback, but the Trojan head coach maintains his confidence.
After a crushing 29-28 loss at Maryland on Saturday, USC football returned to Los Angeles to prepare for a short week of practice before the team takes on Rutgers at 8 p.m. Friday night. With the College Football Playoff essentially off the table for the season, the squad has been struggling to understand its identity within the Big Ten.
However, head coach Lincoln Riley is still fully committed to his vision for USC — a vision that “100 percent” still centers around redshirt junior quarterback Miller Moss.
“Everybody goes through tough stretches,” Riley said of Moss after Monday’s practice. “Everybody goes through times when things don’t fall their way and the best ones continue to battle.”
Though he was in Heisman talks earlier in the season, Moss’ progress has begun to stutter. The quarterback has taken a lot of heat for the Trojans’ late-game losses; the team started 3-0 on the season and all four of its losses have come in one-score games. Moss is 183-of-284 in the air on the season for 1,954 yards (third amongst Big Ten quarterbacks) with 14 touchdowns and six interceptions.
Riley had plenty of praise for his other players as well, calling sophomore wide receiver Makai Lemon someone “Miller and our quarterbacks have got a lot of confidence in.” Lemon caught eight passes on eight targets for 89 yards in the loss to Maryland.
The Trojan head coach also acknowledged redshirt freshman running back Quinten Joyner as “a guy that we’d like to get more opportunities.” Joyner rushed for two touchdowns in the loss to Penn State two weeks ago, including a 75-yard run. But the young back competes for snaps with redshirt senior Woody Marks, someone Riley called “one of [USC’s] best and most consistent players.”
Marks has proven to be formidable on the ground, averaging almost 95 yards per game with five touchdowns on the season so far.
Another bright spot in an otherwise dismal week for the Trojans was the return of redshirt junior tight end Lake McRee, who left USC’s matchup at Michigan in the third quarter with an injury.
“It’s part of the game,” McRee said of his time away from the team. “It’s unfortunate that it happened, and it could’ve been a lot worse, too.”
Freshmen tight ends Walker Lyons and Kade Eldridge held down the fort for the Trojans while their position mate was out.
“I’m really proud of them. They did a really good job,” McRee said. “It’s tough to get thrown out there as a freshman, especially tight end: you’re blocking some big dudes, running routes against some experienced guys. Really proud of those guys, I think it’s really good for them to get that early in their career[s].”
Despite their late-game struggles on the field, the Trojans’ sense of commitment to each other seems to remain intact. Moss, for example, received praise from several teammates despite media criticisms of his turnovers and leadership ability.
“That’s my boy, Miller,” redshirt junior receiver Kyron Hudson said. “I’ve known him for about six years now. So we just continue to build that relationship and that bond, and it just carries onto the field.”
But it’s clear that USC’s shaky start in the Big Ten hasn’t been taken lightly, and that the noise from critics has begun to infiltrate the team.
“Everybody’s gonna say ‘oh well, we’ve gotta finish games better’, well, no s**t,” Riley said. “But number one is: why haven’t we?”
“We’ve had some really unfortunate breaks in several of these [games] but we haven’t been good enough to overcome those,” Riley continued. “And that’s what we’re building to become.”
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