Clay Helton preaches calm: ‘One game doesn’t define our season’

Like a politician giving a stump speech, USC coach Clay Helton hammered a theme during his Sunday evening phone call with reporters, playing to a riled-up base.

“The message to our team is that one game doesn’t define our season,” Helton said. “We had a hard-fought game on the road against a very good opponent. We just finished September. We’re 4-1. And we control our own destiny. We could not say that a year ago.”

He would return to this notion again and again over about 20 minutes. Five times in all, he mentioned that USC is 4-1. Four times, he said that USC controls its own destiny.

Fans expecting sweeping changes after USC’s first loss of the season, to Washington State, 30-27, on Friday evening, were never likely to be satisfied. Helton’s policy is one of stoicism and steadiness. Players like quarterback Sam Darnold cited Helton’s calm in the face of a 1-3 start last season as one reason why USC rescued its season and reached the Rose Bowl.

Helton’s resolve will be tested in the coming weeks as USC addresses an offense on the fritz and the reality of needing to run the table to have a shot at the playoffs.

“As a head coach, you can do one of two things,” Helton said. “Because you have a failure or a loss you can panic and try to scrap everything. Or you can believe in the men that surround you. I choose to believe in the players that surround me as well as our coaches. I really, truly believe they’re gonna get the job done.”

USC has been in this position before. Last season’s loss to Utah in the fourth week left the Trojans in much more dire straits.

USC’s players said they were using that experience as a guide.

“This game is over now,” linebacker Uchenna Nwosu said after walking out of the locker room Friday. “Just next-game mentality.”

Safety Chris Hawkins said USC should focus only on what it could control.

“If we win out, we control what we control,” he said. “A 12-1 team not making it to the playoffs or whatever, I don’t really know how that works. But we’ve just got to do what we’ve got to do.”

But there are crucial differences from a year ago. One, USC switched quarterbacks, to Darnold. And its offense exhibited a general upward trend in total yards while its defense mostly stayed even.

This season has been the opposite. USC’s offensive yardage has declined every game, except for an explosion of yards against Stanford. Its defense has generally trended downward, though not as precipitously.

There is no obvious positional change for Helton to make. Any shot in the arm, such as the one provided by Darnold, would have to come from the injured-player list. USC has seven injured starters, plus three others — running back Stephen Carr, receiver Jalen Greene and defensive tackle Malik Dorton — who play significant minutes.

“When we get a little bit more healthy and a little bit more in tune, I think that everybody will be happy,” Helton said. “We’re 4-1 with our destiny in our hands.”

Helton gave a vote of confidence to offensive coordinator Tee Martin after USC’s worst offensive output of the season.

“As far as the play-calling goes, I don’t have an issue with it,” Helton said. “I wish we would’ve executed better. But I have a lot of faith in Tee and the job that he does on a weekly basis.”

Helton said many of the issues in the passing game stemmed from USC’s tattered offensive line. Washington State pressured Darnold more than usual. That, Helton said, threw off the timing of routes and caused Darnold to scramble just as receivers were breaking open.

“I thought one of the things that Tee did in that game, if you recognized, is he went to more sprints and nakeds to try to move the pocket a little bit, and they were effective for us,” Helton said.

Their effectiveness appears overstated. USC dropped back to pass 35 times and rolled Darnold out of the pocket, or attempted to, six times, or about 17% of drop-backs. That figure includes scrambles, sacks and penalties — one incompletion was whistled for offensive pass interference, while another incompletion resulted in a roughing-the-passer penalty on Washington State.

The movement did appear to be a response to Washington State’s pressure: Five of the rollouts came in the second half.

Those plays averaged 5.3 yards per attempt, lower than USC’s overall average on both passes or runs.

Helton said he would know more about the status of right tackle Chuma Edoga (ankle sprain), right guard Viane Talamaivao (pectoral injury), Carr (foot injury) and defensive tackles Dorton (knee sprain) and Josh Fatu (knee sprain) later in the week. … Helton said he was hopeful left tackle Toa Lobendahn (skin infection) would return for Saturday’s game against Oregon State. … Helton said cornerback Greg Johnson did not undergo shoulder surgery last week but will this week.

zach.helfand@latimes.com

Follow Zach Helfand on Twitter @zhelfand