Oregon week has arrived for USC, and the Trojans are staring at the kind of game that can define a season in one night. A win would change everything.
A loss would hit hard. There really isn’t much middle ground here.
If USC comes out on top, the biggest reason may be the matchup on the sideline: Gary Patterson against Oregon offensive coordinator Drew Mehringer. That’s the chessboard where the Trojans should have the edge.
Last week, it was noted that Mehringer might be in over his head, and the case for that gets even stronger here. Patterson’s résumé as a coordinator and coach towers over anything Mehringer has done in football, and this is the kind of matchup USC ought to control.
There was also an example from Oklahoma State that showed how a defense can gain an edge simply by studying tendencies. It wasn’t sign stealing, just sharp film work and recognition.
Senior linebacker Tate Romney explained it this way: "We were noticing earlier in the week that their (Oregon’s) offensive line had tendencies that helped us key into run (or) pass and a couple areas we could take advantage of," said senior linebacker Tate Romney, "and obviously our defensive line was keyed into that. That was one big thing that gave us a big advantage."
When asked what those tendencies were, he added, "Just their offensive line had a few stance indicators for most of the time run/pass," said Romney.
That’s the kind of detail Patterson lives for. If USC wins the chess match on defense, Oregon’s defense would then have to put Lincoln Riley in a bind, and that’s a tall order. Riley has been one of the better play-callers in college football over the past decade, and expecting Oregon to overwhelm him doesn’t feel realistic.
For USC fans looking for a reason to believe, Patterson versus Mehringer is the clearest one.
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Oregon now looms as the game that can either steady the conversation around Lincoln Riley or drag USC right back into the same familiar debate about whether its ceiling is being capped by a defense that cant keep pace. UCLA Wire editor Dylan McNeill has pointed out that the offense remains a strength, but recent defensive issues have kept the concern alive, and this matchup is the kind that tends to reveal whether those problems are cosmetic or structural. [Read more 🡒]