It's Winter of 2021. Someone travels from the future, and tells a very excited you, who's team has just signed LR to a 10-year deal, that in two seasons the CFP will be expanded to 12 teams. They then say it's 2026, and USC has still not made a single playoff APPEARANCE.

What would your first question be, besides "What stocks to buy?"

Watching USC go 7-5 year after year doesn’t interest me. I know there are diehard thick and thin fans/alums but the combo of hired Hessian soldiers and top 25-50 rankings is off putting for me. Other teams fans charge the field like they just beat the Ditka lead Bears, but in truth they just beat an Iowa State or Virgina Tech or Pittsburgh.

That is who USC is. In the past 46 or so years, we had a 6 year golden moment. We are a top 50 program, we are no longer a blueblood team, and the headwinds against us becoming a top 5 program are too severe.

My 2cts.

…makes me feel better ✌️

Don’t think the chain of events is a coincidence : Baylor lost to Kansas by a point, meanwhile we are humiliated at Wisconsin , EVERYONE DONE, the media shitstorm and articles keep coming today. Our outlook is horrible, five at this stage, no!

So then today Baylor coach is fired and all these articles about LR as a potential, despite buyout. But the most interesting one to me is the CBS article that was posted three days ago saying “Riley has the most absurd contract of the bunch, but also has quietly investigated leaving most.” (posted the link in a recent thread)

The other articles out today mention Baylor being in LR’s home state and in a conference he’s already had province success with so sort of like him going home.

I basically think this could mean there have been talks for a while, and after all the bad press, perhaps Baylor fired their coach because LR plans to go / leave amicably sometime this season or at the end of it!

Would be the best case scenario for admin and LR for it to go down like this. Fans and alum would be happy.

Makes total sense, right?!?! Trying to hold out hope for next season because given up at this point!

Thoughts?!

And it looks like we’ve been dropped out of the top 25.

https://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings

Ohio State’s defense is ranked #6, Indiana’s is #8, UCLA’s is #10, and Wisconsin’s is #13 nationally. If this is how we’re going to play against the top 15 defenses in the country, we’re cooked.

Just like us Marc is sick of this Bs 🤦🏿‍♂️

I'm not here to have a convo or to vent. UCLA is gonna make a playoff appearance before us. Adios Linc!

I found my new favorite nickname for Riley…LinkdIn! The internet is still undefeated!

In all seriousness, I do wonder if we did cut ties with CLR, what that would mean for Bowden? I figure, any “big name” HC candidate would want his own GM. Are we willing to sacrifice a guy who reinvigorated our recruiting and landed a #1 class?

The only HC name where that wouldn’t be an issue would be Marcus Freeman. Him and Bowden are best friends and I’ve always wondered about whether Bowden would be able to lure Freeman out West.

Title

Fire Linc….dude can’t even call a proper timeout.

It's been 5 years of this you should have known we weren't getting past Wisconsin

Come on guys. Save us from this misery. This is pocket change for you.

He's a statistician. It's all X's and O's to him. And, that mindset ripples down from him through his coaching hires and team culture

Which is great, when everything is clicking like clockwork. But, when a game bogs down, and scheme isn't working, some games devolve down to man against man toughness. It's trench warfare, where there's nothing left but breaking the will of an opponent to compete. Toughness

As we have seen year after year, when games end up at that level, Lincoln's teams don't have it. It showed in the Oregon game, and it showed again in this game.

It's ok to be a cerebral HC, if you've got a staff of rabid dogs like Orgeron, Pola, Tim Davis, Ken Norton jr. They make sure the players, especially linemen, are frothing at the mouths. The team is salivating for that fight

We just don't ever see that from Riley teams. Which is why they hop out to quick leads, then fade. Even worse, when they start slow and never find a gear.

This offense walked into this game emotionally flat, if not on their heels. Oline was not winning the battle, receivers dropping balls, Maiava rattled

Wisconsin got tough, and we could not match it.

We are now losing to bad teams (including Oregon). Riley is now Helton version 1.5, I can't even give him 2.0

He's not going to suddenly discover how to field a tough team. He doesn't have that gear. It's everything they said about him at Oklahoma.

Legit wondering why we signed such a long contract

Tonight was a pure, unadulterated shit sandwich.

I’ve been thinking about where this 24-7 disaster against an unranked Wisconsin team ranks among Lincoln Riley’s worst defeats since taking over. While the Tulane collapse was a historic defensive meltdown, I honestly think tonight takes the crown for his most embarrassing and concerning loss yet.

Here is my "Mount Rushmore of Riley Disasters" stacks up:

1. Tonight: Wisconsin 24, USC 7

This wasn't a classic Alex Grinch defensive collapse we used to get where the offense dragged us along. This was a complete, systematic failure of Lincoln Riley’s calling card. Coming off a bye week with extra time to prepare, the offense looked completely toothless and uninspired. We scored 7 points in 60 minutes, missed two field goals, turned it over twice, and got absolutely bullied at the line of scrimmage to the tune of -17 total rushing yards. It was an offensive humiliation.

1. The 2025 Alamo Bowl: TCU 28, USC 27 (wasted time to attend this one)

We held a 95% win probability late in the game before Riley went into absolute "turtle mode." His ultra-conservative shell in the second half stagnant-ized the red-zone offense. Combine that with a defense that missed four tackles on a single 3rd and 20, and a guaranteed win turned into an embarrassing postseason choke.

1. The 2023 Cotton Bowl: Tulane 46, USC 45

In terms of legendary defensive failure, this is the gold standard. Caleb threw for 462 yards and 5 touchdowns, and it still wasn't enough because the defense allowed Tulane to score 16 points in the final 4 minutes and 7 seconds of the game.

Tulane was a more heartbreaking collapse, but tonight is easily the most alarming. It proved that when a Big Ten defense takes away his initial script, Riley has absolutely no answers.

Don't think anyone at SC reads this stuff, but real talk from an alumni I was ready to mail my two degrees back to the university in the second half. Fucking embarrassing.

This guy is so damn soft and lazy man. The team's performance is a reflection of this coach and the soft culture he has allowed over the past 5 years. I am done.

USC's website for football parking directs you to use JustPark to reserve campus parking for games. We went ahead and did this for Saturday's game to avoid any issues game day (plus we like the walk to the stadium). However, the email confirmation from JustPark says we must leave the parking before 6:30pm. The game starts at 4:30pm, so I'm assuming this is just a typo?

The email also says that parking is only guaranteed for 2 hours prior to the game start, so we'll try to get there by 2:30pm.

But any information or experience with JustPark would be helpful!

The last time I posted a list of college coaches people said it was AI and cried that I don’t understand ball after the Washington win but I’ll bring a short list up again. I don’t think we fire, Lincoln Riley because the university is running a huge deficit and the buyout is too big. Please add any names you actually think we can get.

Spencer Danielson out of Boise State, you can get him on the cheap and he’s a defensive minded head coach
Or
Jason Eck out of New Mexico, he’s turned them into a really good team and he’s an old offensive linemen who played in the big 10 so he can get our line shaped up
Or
Matt Entz out of Fresno State, they’re having it down yet, but he’s a proven winner who knows the school
Or
Glenn Schumann george’s defensive coordinator, we might take the coordinator route if we don’t like any of the head coaches out there

I don’t think we should go for a big name, because the school won’t pay for it again. Those are the best for outside of the big names, so I believe those are the ones we will go for.