USC’s preseason bowl forecast is pointing to a familiar destination.
Steve Lassan of Athlon Sports released his 2026 college football bowl and playoff projections, and he has the Trojans headed back to the Alamo Bowl for the second straight season. In Lassan’s projection, USC would face BYU in the Dec. 29 game.
That would mean another year without a College Football Playoff berth for a program still chasing its first appearance in the event. USC opens its 2026 season at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Saturday, Aug. 29 against San Jose State, but the early projection says the wait for a playoff trip would stretch into 2027.
The Trojans were in the Alamo Bowl in 2025 after going 9-3 in the regular season. They matched up with TCU and came up short in a 30-27 overtime loss, finishing 9-4 overall.
For most programs, that kind of season would be a solid step. For USC, it still feels like a holding pattern.
This is a school with 11 national championships, eight Heisman Trophy winners and a long track record of sending players to the NFL. But the standard in Los Angeles has always been higher than just getting to a bowl.
USC was a national force for years, winning at least 11 games and the Pac-10 title every season from 2002-2008. That stretch included national championships in 2003 and 2004, plus four more Rose Bowl appearances and three wins there.
Since 2008, though, the Trojans have won only one conference title and played in just one Rose Bowl. That drop-off is the backdrop for everything surrounding the program now.
Lincoln Riley was hired after the 2021 season to change that. USC brought in the former Oklahoma coach on a reported 10-year, $110 million deal, and 2026 will be his fifth season leading the Trojans. So far, his teams have reached bowl games every year and missed the playoff each time.
Riley’s record at USC stands at 35-18, and his best season came in 2022, when the Trojans went 11-1 in the regular season and reached the Pac-12 Championship Game. A win over Utah would have nearly locked up a College Football Playoff spot, but USC lost and has not returned to a conference title game since.
Now the pressure shifts to a new format that gives teams more room to break through. The playoff has expanded to 12 teams, and USC has a better path than it did under the old four-team setup. DraftKings Sportsbook lists the Trojans at +240 to make the playoff this season.
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USC Just Landed The Kind Of 2027 Win Fans Have Wanted
USCs recruiting momentum for the 2026 and 2027 classes keeps building, and the latest wave of commitments gives the Trojans a far different look than the one fans had been used to seeing on the trail. Cornerback Danny Lang, five-star athlete Honor Faalave-Johnson and five-star edge Mekai Brown all point to a staff that has started landing premium talent with more consistency, while also showing it can win key battles against other major programs for local and national targets.
The bigger takeaway for USC is how intentional the approach has become, especially on defense and along the front. The Trojans have made a clear push to stockpile pass rushers and linemen, and Brown fits into that broader plan after drawing heavy attention from schools such as Notre Dame, Ohio State, Ole Miss and Texas A&M. With more high-end prospects still in play, the real question now is how far this surge can carry the class before signing day arrives. [Read more 🡒]
USC Just Got A Surprising Preseason Snub In The Passing Game
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Maiava gave the Trojans a full season of stability in 2025, starting all 13 games and throwing for 3,711 yards with 24 touchdowns, while Hines flashed as a freshman with 34 catches for 561 yards and two scores. Under Lincoln Riley, that kind of foundation usually invites bigger expectations, and the question now is whether USCs next step comes quickly enough to turn a promising tandem into one of the sports most feared aerial duos. [Read more 🡒]
Big Ten Quarterback Debate Just Took A Turn USC Fans Will Notice
The Big Ten quarterback conversation has started to tilt in Julian Sayins direction, and USC fans have reason to keep an eye on it. Dalton Wasserman and Max Chadwick slotted the Ohio State passer as the fourth-best player in college football, putting him three spots ahead of Dante Moore in the same ranking and giving fresh fuel to the league-wide debate over which quarterback sits at the top of the conference.
Sayins case is built on more than reputation. In his first season as Ohio States starter, he completed 77.0% of his passes and set a PFF College single-season record for accurate throw rate, while also leading all FBS quarterbacks in PFF passing grade. For USC, the comparison with Moore is the part that matters most, because the Big Tens quarterback pecking order could end up shaping the road ahead. [Read more 🡒]