Will the upcoming 2025 season show a make-or-break 12 months for USC head coach Lincoln Riley?
It is a tough query to reply. On the one hand, after a stable first season on the helm of the Trojans, Riley’s workforce has carried out at a sub-par degree the previous two years, Throughout that point, he is gone a mixed 15-11, albeit with two straight bowl-game wins.
Then again, as ESPN senior author Heather Dinich famous this week on the “Get Up” present, Riley has a “prolonged contract and an enormous buyout.”
So even when he underperforms but once more in 2025, it is likely to be troublesome to justify a possible firing of Riley. For that purpose, Dinich and different nationwide consultants do not essentially assume Riley is firmly on the recent seat in 2025.
However Dinich did say of Riley: “He is aware of, due to the place he’s, he’s underneath super strain.”
In early July, CBS Sports activities issued its hot-seat rankings for all FBS head coaches for the upcoming season. Riley falls into the “strain is mounting” class.
All through the course of school soccer historical past, USC has been one of many greatest manufacturers within the sport. Profitable seven or eight video games in a season will not lower it. Positive, the Trojans are within the loaded Large Ten Convention, the place Michigan and Ohio State have claimed the previous two nationwide titles.
What’s extra, Oregon is a juggernaut that spent a lot of the 2024 marketing campaign at No. 1 within the main polls. Penn State reached final season’s semifinal spherical of the Faculty Soccer Playoff, and the Nittany Lions are a significant contender to go deep within the CFP this coming season.
Within the preseason coaches top-25 ballot launched initially of the week, USC arrived within the “others receiving votes” class (No. 4 general there). Six Large Ten groups, in the meantime, reside within the prime 25.
The Trojans’ 2025 schedule is stacked, with street dates to Illinois, Nebraska and Oregon. At residence, USC will host Michigan, Iowa and cross-town rival UCLA. Within the non-conference slate, the Trojans will head to long-time rival Notre Dame, the nationwide runner-up a season in the past.
Final month, when the Large Ten unveiled its annual preseason media ballot, USC checked in at No. 9 general. USC followers, boosters and others will not be completely satisfied if their program finishes 2025 as a middle-of-the-pack workforce within the Large Ten.
There are causes for cautious optimism, although, at USC. For one, in 2024, the Trojans misplaced 5 Large Ten contests by seven factors or fewer, as Dinich identified.
USC had a top-15 recruiting class in 2025. In 2026, thus far, its recruiting cycle is No. 1 nationwide, in accordance with Rivals.
Dinich summed it up by saying that Riley “instructed me this summer season that he feels they’re proper on the doorstep.”
