What Lincoln Riley said after No. 15 USC lost to No. 7 Oregon

LINCOLN RILEY

Opening Statement…

“Great battle out there. We had two good football teams really going at it. I thought the game was really back and forth in a lot of ways. I think we’ll look back on it and say the defining sequence of the game was the missed field goal, penalty, and then touchdown. We got down there and didn’t score any points. That, along with the punt return. Other than that, both defenses and offenses made big plays. It was just a heavyweight battle, with two really good teams going at it. In that sequence, Oregon made more plays than us. In my opinion, that was the difference in the game. That was a hell of a battle. Our guys fought like crazy. Obviously, we did it very shorthanded. We continued to push and gave ourselves some pretty good opportunities but couldn’t get over the hump. We are disappointed that we didn’t play our best. We had some penalties that we haven’t been having. Those definitely hurt us. We were gutsy, made a lot of plays, but in the end, we were a couple of plays short. We are disappointed in the locker room, but we have to rebound. We have a rivalry game coming up next week at our place. We will get back to preparation and get ready to play.”

On the leaping penalty…

“He just kind of panicked a little bit and did something that we don’t teach. Obviously, it hurt us.”

On the message to the team with three losses and possibly not making it to the playoffs…

“We don’t make our plans contingent on how things go. How we play is just how we play. This is USC, and the standard here is incredibly high in our locker room. We will start to prepare for UCLA on the plane, get ready for that game, and then figure it out after that.”

On problems with the special teams today…

“Our kicker has been one of the best, if not the best, in the country all year. He didn’t hit the ball badly; it just caught the bar and popped back out. On that punt return, we hit a kind of low-line drive punt, and it was probably our worst coverage of the day on top of that. That is one as a punter you try to avoid because it gets down fast. There was a lot of room, and we got held up in a couple of spots. We did not do a good job of leveraging the ball. Obviously, it was a huge play in the game. Oregon is a good offensive team, so you don’t want to give them something like that. Both teams had their moments outside of that sequence, to me. There were moments where they outplayed us and moments where we outplayed them. That sequence, to me, was the one where real separation in the game occurred.”

On not being able to run the ball as much against Oregon’s defense…

“We had a couple of busts. J’Onre Reed got in there and gutted it out for us; he wasn’t very healthy. Killian going down was a factor; there’s no question about that. Obviously, it was hard not having Paige. We missed a couple of assignments in the run game where we had opportunities. Oregon is good up front. We knew that. Their defensive line is good, and their defensive tackles did a nice job against us. We didn’t help that fact by missing a couple of assignments that hurt us. We didn’t run the ball nearly as well as we have, or as well as we expected to.”

On Kennedy Urlacher and Christian Pierce starting today…

“They fought. They are two fighters. They tackle the ball, they are violent, and they are contact-seekers. A couple of plays that I want back from a communication standpoint, but both of those guys, against a good offense like that, made some good plays.”

On what this game says about their growth this season…

“I mean, we are right there. That was two heavyweight teams going at it. That was two good football teams right there. These two teams have won a lot of games. We are playing good enough right now that we are a sequence like that away from beating anybody. That is just how I feel: two good teams going at it. We are going to keep getting better and better as time goes on. We have a good team, that is what this game tells me.”

On how he thinks this season has been successful despite maybe not making the playoffs…

“I get the question, but the season is not over. We have a game next week. We are going to get ready for UCLA. We have won a bunch of games this year. The ones we haven’t won, we have been right there. We have a great opportunity to get win number nine this week. That is what we are going to put our focus on.”

On the explanation for hitting the punter…

“It is a judgment call. They deemed that it wasn’t enough to be a 15-yard penalty. That one looked like, to me, it could have gone either way. We were far enough back that we really thought about going for it there. He ended up hitting a pretty good punt, so we just rolled with the result of the kick.”

On what he saw from Tanook Hines today…

“He played well and made a lot of big plays down the field. They gave a lot of attention to Lemon. I mean Lemon still affected the game in a lot of ways. Tanook and Ja’Kobi (Lane) both made a lot of big plays. Jayden (Maiava) made a lot of great throws to them down the field. He is a young guy who has a bright future.”

On his message to the USC fans after this game…

“This has been an inspiring team to watch all year. Show up next week. USC vs. UCLA, show your appreciation for this team and the way they have fought. We are just going to keep getting better and better. They’ve been awesome all year, and we’ve played phenomenally at home. We look forward to seeing them at the Coliseum next Saturday.”