USC Football: Lincoln Riley Acknowledges the Challenges of Going Undefeated

The margin of error got much smaller for USC moving forward...

After a few close calls over the past few weeks, the USC Trojans finally dropped a game this season. The team was blown out over the weekend by their arch-rival Notre Dame, and the dream of an undefeated season was gone.

The Trojans couldn't do anything to stop the Fighting Irish in this one, and a poor performance from reigning Heisman Trophy winner Caleb Williams did them in. It was a bad game overall from this Trojans team, and now their chances to reach their goals seem much more unattainable.

However, head coach Lincoln Riley is trying to remain optimistic about things, and he spoke on the challenges of going undefeated throughout a season.

“As a head coach, I’ve been a part of teams — several of them we’ve had a loss throughout the year because it’s pretty damn tough to go undefeated in college football. In case anyone hasn’t noticed, it doesn’t happen very often. But throughout my career as a head coach, we’ve had one time where we took a loss somewhere in the year and didn’t end up in the conference championship game. One time. In that game, we were one play away from being in the conference championship game there, too."



Per Lincoln Riley via SaturdayOutWest.com

It was always going to be tough for the Trojans to reach the National Championship, even if they remained undefeated, but now, with one loss, it's even harder. This team has seen themselves somewhat fall apart over the last few weeks, especially on defense.

This loss to Notre Dame is a tough one to swallow because the Fighting Irish were ranked well behind them. Now, all they can do is move forward to make sure this type of performance doesn't happen again.

“This group is more than capable. Now we’ve got to go do it. We’ve got to go make the corrections. We’ve got to go fix the things that we’ve got to fix. We’ve got to go coach and play better. But is it in our power? Is it something we’re capable of? I believe it to my core and we’re going to go fight our ass off to get it done.”

Per Lincoln Riley via SaturdayOutWest.com

Unless the issues on defense change, the Trojans will fall flat once again. The offense finally had a down day, and USC got exposed. USC can still make their goals come true if they win out, but the margin of error just got that much smaller for the Trojans.

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