Lincoln Riley is hoping to build USC more like the defending national champions.
USC’s head football coach told The Athletic that he wants to construct his roster similar to how Michigan built its roster en route to winning a title in 2023, stating a desire to develop high school recruits to help be less reliant on the transfer portal.
“The only way that model works — you go get the best developers of talent, and you give the best high school players a reason for why they would want to sign with USC,” Riley reportedly told The Athletic, recognizing that the development approach requires patience.
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Many of Riley’s top contributors over his first two seasons at Southern Califonia have been transfers. Caleb Williams, Jordan Addison, Travis Dye and Brenden Rice paid immediate dividends as transfer additions for USC’s offense in 2022, helping the Trojans go 11-3 as Williams also won the Heisman Trophy.
Riley and USC tried to replicate that success on defense in 2023, using the transfer portal to try and rebuild that side of his roster. It added seven players who ended up being starters or notable contributors throughout the season, but USC didn’t see the same success it saw with its offensive transfer portal additions in 2022. USC ranked 122nd in yards allowed per game (438.8) and 121st in points allowed per game (34.4) in the country.
USC has slightly scaled back on its transfer portal additions this offseason, adding 11 transfers so far after 15 transfers joined the team last season. In terms of recruiting, USC has been among the best in the nation since Riley’s arrival, though it isn’t churning out elite classes like other national title hopefuls. The Trojans had the eighth-best class in 2023 and the 17th-best class in 2024, per 247 Sports’ composite ranking.
While Riley hinted that it could take time to build a title contender through development, he pointed to Michigan to show that it is possible.
“They built it and, in a lot of ways, did it the right way,” Riley told The Athletic.
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Michigan’s recruiting classes in the lead-up to its national title ranked similarly to where USC’s have ranked under Riley. The Wolverines’ recruiting classes ranked 10th, 13th, ninth and 17th in 247 Sports’ composite rankings in each of the four years prior to winning a title. Their talent composition ranked 14th in college football, and they only had two five-star recruits on their roster in 2023.
Michigan’s roster wasn’t bereft of transfers, but most of its moves in the portal were to help round out the roster as opposed to serving as the foundation. Only two of its starters in the national title game were added from the transfer portal.
USC will get to face off against the team it’s hoping to model itself after early next season. It takes on Michigan in Ann Arbor in Week 4 for its first-ever Big Ten conference game.
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