USC left United Airlines Field with a 49-30 win over Louisiana, but the final score did a better job of flattering the Trojans than the performance itself.
This was supposed to be the easiest night on the schedule, and in one sense it was. USC had the better players, the better finishers and enough explosive talent to separate when the game started to wobble.
Mark Bowman, Trent Mosley and Luke Wafle all showed why that edge mattered. But the Trojans also dragged along too many familiar mistakes, and for long stretches the game looked sloppier than Lincoln Riley would have wanted against an opponent USC should have put away more cleanly.
Bowman was the biggest offensive breakout. He caught six passes for 83 yards and scored twice, doing it all before the second half even began.
One of the night’s best plays came late in the first quarter, when the 6-foot-4, 235-pound tight end slipped free on play action, caught the ball in the middle of the field and hurdled two defenders on a 35-yard gain. He later scored from five and nine yards out to help push USC into a 14-3 lead.
Mosley provided the kind of jolt that can change the feel of a game in a hurry. Late in the first half, he fielded a punt, turned the corner and raced 86 yards for a touchdown that woke up both the crowd and the Trojans. He also added two catches for 33 yards, including a 21-yard touchdown on a 50/50 ball from Maiava.
On defense, Wafle was a constant headache for Louisiana even beyond the stat sheet. He finished with seven tackles and a tackle for loss, but the numbers barely captured how disruptive he was. On one third-down snap, he blew past the right tackle to the inside so fast that the play was dead almost as soon as the ball reached quarterback Lunch Winfield.
Still, USC kept giving Louisiana openings. Penalties kept showing up at the worst possible moments, and Riley made it clear that was a major concern after the game.
Elbert Hill IV roughed kicker Tony Sterner after a missed 33-yard field goal, and Louisiana turned that fresh set of downs into a touchdown two Winfield runs later. Earlier, the Ragin' Cajuns were stalled by an unsportsmanlike penalty on head coach Michael Desourmeaux, only for USC to follow that up by busting coverage and allowing tight end Brock Chappell to beat Kennedy Urlacher up the seam for 35 yards.
The Trojans finished with eight penalties for 78 yards, split evenly between offense and defense. Louisiana had six penalties for 65 yards. That kind of messiness made the night feel a lot closer to USC’s level than it should have.
"The penalties are going to be the most alarming thing for us tonight," Riley said after the game. "It was a lot and they were really at horrible times.
There's never really good times for penalties, but we had some in just some really inopportune times, and so something we got to clean up a lot. There's no doubt about that."
Louisiana also forced USC to deal with a different kind of quarterback run game than it had seen in the previous two weeks, and the Trojans knew that was coming. Winfield had only five carries for 15 yards at halftime, but he finished with 14 carries for 95 yards and two touchdowns. His 32-yard scoring run early in the fourth quarter put another clean number on the board for USC, even if the overall standard of play never quite matched the final margin.
"Give Louisiana a lot of credit," Riley said. "Their quarterback's a hell of a player.
We said that all week. He makes a lot of plays and covers up a lot, and those guys competed hard and are a good football team."
Maiava also put up big numbers, finishing 19-of-29 with a career-best five touchdown passes. But the line came with blemishes.
He threw a first-quarter interception and should have had a second, and he was also off target on some throws USC has been used to seeing him hit this season. His touchdown pass to Kayden Dixon-Wyatt threaded through Maurion Eleam’s hands in the end zone, but the overall night still included a few too many misses.
USC got the win and moved to 3-0, but this was also the first game of the season in which the Trojans didn’t look like they were moving forward. The better habits that showed up in the first two games faded too often against Louisiana, and that matters because Big Ten play is next. The softer part of the schedule is almost gone, and USC will need a cleaner week of work before the real tests arrive.
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