Lincoln Riley "super proud" of his USC football team after blowout of Rutgers

Friday night in the Coliseum, the USC football team picked up a much-needed 42-20 win over Rutgers. Moving to 4-4 on the season and 2-4 in Big Ten play, the Trojans looked more like the team that most have expected them to be all season long.

After the game, as one might expect, head coach Lincoln Riley was in high spirits.

"Super proud of this football team," he said. "Just all that we've been through, to turn around here on a short week, come play the way we did with our backs against the wall, missing obviously some key players -- had a number of guys step up. There's no excuses in this program, our coaches and players, the entire week -- we had a really good week -- and fun to see us come play well and separate.

"I thought one of the big pushes for us in this game is we know Coach Schiano's reputation, Rutgers' reputation, and being the most physical team was really, really important to us. We harped on that this week and I thought our guys rose to the occasion and played just a really physical football game all the way around. So, obviously great to get the win, excited locker room in there, fun to see the guys with big smiles on their faces and we'll look to take this extra day obviously this upcoming week, hope to use it to our advantage to freshen up a little bit and get ready for the stretch one."

The breakout star of the game for USC was wide receiver Makai Lemon. Not only did he have a game-changing 80-yard kickoff return in the first half, but he also caught four passes for 134 yards and a touchdown. Riley talked about the play of his young emerging star.

"Yeah, obviously he had the big kickoff return," Riley said, "which was a really good, aggressive play, and then I thought he just made some really competitive catches, some big plays after the catch, just playing fast, playing confident. It was kind of his night when the ball found him, and he made some really good, aggressive plays, so he just continues to improve as a player."

All season, USC has struggled to put teams away. After the game, he talked about what his team did differently to separate from the Scarlet Knights and avoid being in a game that was up for grabs in the fourth quarter.

"Yeah, we just played better," he said. "We didn't make some of the same mistakes that have plagued us. I know it kind of sounds simple, but we did -- we just played better. We took care of the ball, we did a good job in special teams. Defensively, we needed to do a better job on third down. It wasn't our best third -down game -- I haven't seen the final stats -- but we did a great job of limiting their points. We did a really good job of red-zone defense and then had some big stops there, so yeah, just winning football on all three sides."

Turning back to Lemon, he replaced Zach Branch as USC's primary kickoff returner against Rutgers. Riley talked about what went into that decision.

"It was a big spark," he said. "Yeah, we've always felt we've got multiple good returners, and I think the feeling was, was to let Zach really zero in on punt returns and give Makai a shot to really zero in on kickoff returns, which was a great move by Coach Dougherty and crew, and obviously it paid dividends."

Another storyline from the game was the play of the defense, which was missing several key members including four starters in the secondary. Riley said he and the coaching staff had to be creative with how they deployed their players on that side of the ball.

"We did a good job," he said. "You know, we got a lead early and it probably put them in position where we were going to see a little bit more throw game, but no, our guys did a good job. We had to move some positions around. We got really thin really quick after the end of the Maryland game, so we had to be pretty creative and I give Coach Belk, Coach Lynn, those guys credit. We got some guys ready to play, had some guys step in there. We made a few mistakes, but we were competitive, we tackled well and made some of the big plays when it counted."

Finally, Riley talked about whether or not he did anything differently as a coach in this game as compared to the recent losses his team has suffered. As you might expect, he said that he just kept with what he believed would work.

"No, stayed the course," he said. "I think when you have adversity it tests your resolve and tests how committed you are to the process and the things you do, and going through this last few weeks has made me even more sure of where I'm at and what we're doing."