USC news: Lincoln Riley believes Trojans ‘have the people’ to compete for title

USC football thought it had made a home run hire when it lured Lincoln Riley away from Oklahoma in 2021, but the results haven’t exactly followed suit with what was expected of the program under the offensive guru.

USC has still yet to make a College Football Playoff appearance under Riley after the head coach made the playoff three times at Oklahoma. He was a game away from the CFP back in 2022 before losing the Pac-12 Championship Game to Utah, and he also had the Trojans in position to make the 12-team field a year ago.

Even though USC was taken out of playoff contention late in 2025 with a loss to Oregon in November, it still has sky-high expectations coming int the 2026 season due to the return of quarterback Jayden Maiava. Maiava had a great year in 2025 and is now a Heisman Trophy favorite and a potential first-round pick in the NFL Draft heading into what is likely his final season at USC.

Along with Maiava, Riley is confident that the rest of the roster has what it takes to finally get over that CFP hump and compete for a title this season, via On3 Sports.

“You got to go win the games. We have the people to do it,” Riley said. “We have more reasons why we should and could do it versus why maybe we can’t.”

The biggest question surrounding USC is what it is going to do at wide receiver after losing both Makai Lemon and Ja’Kobi Lane to the NFL. While that room is likely to take a step back, even more improvement from Maiava along with what should be a formidable running back room can make up for that loss.

Former TCU head coach Gary Patterson is also in LA now as the new defensive coordinator under Riley. Defense has commonly been the problem for Riley-coached teams dating back to his time in Norman, so the hope is that Patterson can get that fixed in 2026. If he can, it wouldn’t be surprising to see USC competing for a Big Ten title and a CFP berth.