LOS ANGELES – It takes a little less than four hours to fly from Minneapolis to Los Angeles, and yet USC’s trek home last Saturday felt much longer, cursed to sit in the sky with the memory of plays they’d left behind.
A few days later, asked if any sense of what-if had crept into his mind, Trojans quarterback Miller Moss reacted like he’d been asked if the sky was blue.
“I mean, obviously,” Moss said. “You’d rather win the game than not. But can’t do anything about that now.”
This program’s identity has been formed around him, around the kid who waited for his shot at leading Lincoln Riley’s offense and stuck it out for three years. Even as Moss struggled to generate offensive momentum at times in last Saturday’s 24-17 loss to Minnesota, finishing 23-of-38 for 200 yards, a touchdown and a couple picks, Riley made plenty clear he was sticking by him to media Thursday: “He is undoubtedly our starter and will be.”
And Moss’ messaging to his program, with USC limping at 3-2 in the days since that Minnesota loss, has been simple. It’s the same messaging, in a way, that he delivers upon himself. Adversity is a test of character. A test of preparation.
“We have two pretty clear choices to double down on who we are,” Moss said Tuesday. “Come closer as a team, and go forward with a great opportunity that we have this weekend, or let this affect us and deter us from what we ultimately want to do.”
USC’s ability to go forward as a program, ultimately, will hinge on Moss and Riley’s ability to unpack new wrinkles thrown at them by Big Ten defenses. This is no longer Caleb Williams’ offense, predisposed to splashes of color outside the lines that transformed best-laid play sketches into Jackson Pollock paintings. Moss is an on-field extension of Riley, a precise artist who’s taken what he’s given.
Minnesota, a program overmatched in talent but overflowing with grit, laid plain a blueprint to beat USC last weekend. Throw a heavy dose of soft-zone defensive coverage at Moss and Riley to limit big plays. Let the clock run on offense, with a heavy ground attack, to limit possessions. Wait out offensive impatience until the Trojans slip and beat themselves with turnovers.
And USC will host a fourth-ranked Penn State team, on Saturday at the Coliseum, that’s capable of doing everything Minnesota did Saturday – run-stoppers on the defensive line, cornerbacks skilled in one-on-one coverage, edge rushers able to create pressure on USC’s tackles – and capable of doing it better.
“You gotta make ‘em pay,” Moss said Tuesday, when asked about the offense’s ability to force defenses to play tighter man coverage. “Like we – you can’t move the ball really, really well .. and then stall out on a drive. You gotta make defenses pay.”
“Because if you don’t, they’re going to keep doing what they’re doing.”
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He’ll have a tall task, on Saturday afternoon, figuring out how to make Penn State pay. The Nittany Lions boast a pair of defensive linemen, in tackle Zane Durant and end Abdul Carter, who have combined for 13 tackles for loss and 5.5 sacks. And 6-foot-2, 236-pound linebacker Tony Rojas is adept at dropping back in coverage, allowing just seven catches on 13 targets this year. Edge Dani Dennis-Sutton has nearly double the amount of quarterback pressures (19) of anyone on USC’s roster.
There’s little hope of taking the top off, again, on this Penn State unit. But there was “no point” against Minnesota, Moss pointed out on Tuesday, at which he didn’t feel his offense wasn’t moving the ball well. Riley trusted running back Woody Marks with 20 carries, to the tune of 134 yards. Moss marched USC steadily, on quick-hits and third-down conversions, before two second-half picks.
“We need to be a little bit better,” Riley said, after the loss to Minnesota. “Because we had the makings of a really good team tonight.”
They need more than just the makings, against Penn State.
