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- USC rallied from a halftime deficit to defeat Iowa 26-21 Saturday, keeping its College Football Playoff hopes alive heading into next week.
- Wide receiver Makai Lemon caught 10 passes for 153 yards and a touchdown, leading the Trojans’ second-half turnaround.
- USC’s defense dominated after halftime, holding Iowa to only 108 yards.
When a third consecutive second-half turnaround was finally complete, Lincoln Riley leaped into the air, his arms spread wide to the heavens. The last three rain-soaked hours, for USC and its coach, had swung wildly from frustration to elation, with little in between. His defense had nearly unraveled at the hands of Iowa’s sputtering offense. His team’s College Football Playoff hopes had nearly washed away with the rain.
Yet this moment, as the Trojans’ defense put the final touches on a 26-21 win over Iowa, was nothing short of a euphoric, season-shifting one for USC and its coach.
“Culture win right there, man, if there ever was one,” Riley said.
The rain was still pouring down on USC’s offense when a penalty ended any hope of a desperate Hawkeyes comeback. Right away, Riley turned to his sideline and roared. Jumping up and down, eventually he found the arms of defensive line coach Shaun Nua to land in. A referee even tried to step in, so as to calm the coach down, but after he walked away, Riley turned to his sideline and picked up right where he left off, leaping and pumping his fist.
He had every reason to celebrate, after a third straight second half in which USC’s defense allowed three points or fewer to its opponent. This time, when USC needed it most, the unit pitched a shutout, allowing Iowa to pick up only 108 yards despite being down both of its starting safeties.
They didn’t do it alone. Top wideouts Makai Lemon and Ja’Kobi Lane turned in one of the more impressive combined performances in recent memory. Lane’s acrobatic catches on third down kept USC’s offense moving in the second half, while Lemon caught 10 passes for 153 yards, none bigger than the touchdown he scored late in the third quarter to cut a one-time, 14-point deficit to two.
It was the sort of resilience not seen out of USC since arguably Riley’s first season. And lately, it’s been the Trojans’ calling card.
“The whole team was ready to lay it on the line today,” Riley said. “And that’s what you have to have in these big games.”
A fortunate bounce or two doesn’t hurt, either. Only four plays after Lemon reeled in his eighth score of the season, a deflected third-down pass from Iowa quarterback Mark Gronowski landed in the hands of freshman defensive lineman Jahkeem Stewart. USC took its first lead on a touchdown run from Bryan Jackson shortly after that. It never relinquished the lead from there.
To think, no more than two hours earlier, it seemed USC’s defense would be precisely what doomed its hopes of a special season. It gave up three touchdowns on Iowa’s first four drives. But on its next four drives, Iowa managed zero points and only 67 total yards.
“We just had to remind ourselves who we are,” cornerback DeCarlos Nicholson said, “and then go prove it.”
USC’s comeback from a two-touchdown deficit against Iowa shows the Trojans are tough enough to potentially beat Oregon and make the College Football Playoff.
USC will get that chance on a much bigger stage next weekend, with the whole college football world watching. No. 8 Oregon awaits in a road game with huge playoff implications for both teams. For the Trojans, all of those hopes hinge on winning in Eugene, Ore., where they haven’t won since 2011.
Doing so means somehow solving this week why USC’s defense has taken so long to settle in. That sort of slow start won’t fly against the Ducks, who not only have a top-10 scoring offense, but also a top-10 scoring defense.
“Good teams are going to take advantage of [our slow starts],” safety Christian Pierce said. “We’ve gotta hone in.”
There were other complicating factors Saturday, not the least of which being the weather.
A tarp was unfurled across the field almost a full day earlier, in anticipation Saturday would bring the sort of downpour the Coliseum hadn’t seen in years. In fact, it’d been years since the stadium had seen rain at all throughout a college football game, the last time during a win over Notre Dame in 2016.
As the rain fell overnight, a maintenance crew armed with leaf blowers and giant squeegees worked up to kickoff to keep the field in decent condition. There was only so much they could do.
The weather begged for a ground-heavy game. But the Hawkeyes instead came out firing on their opening drive, their 132nd-ranked passing offense moving effectively down the field. On a fourth and one, near the goal line, Gronowski rolled out and delivered a touchdown pass in traffic, just his sixth in eight games this season.
It wasn’t so seamless of a start for USC. The Trojans opened with a three-and-out series, followed by a shanked punt. On their next drive, Riley opted to go for it on a fourth and one near midfield, and Iowa, whose defense is the best in the nation on fourth down, stuffed running back King Miller.
The Hawkeyes led 21-7 in the final minutes of the second quarter, with USC’s hope of the playoff suddenly hanging by a thread.
But the message from Riley at halftime resonated. USC came out looking like a totally different team, led by a dominant defensive effort.
And hours later, as Riley bounded joyfully up the tunnel of the Coliseum, the rain behind him had slowed, revealing a bright rainbow over the peristyle.
