Tag: Jayden Maiava

Jayden Maiava needs his bowl game to produce lots of information

Jayden Maiava has to make significant gains in understanding and knowledge in USC’s bowl game versus Texas A&M. It’s less about the numbers, more about the mind.

To say that the transfer portal has significantly affected college football would be a massive understatement. In today’s era, it is nearly impossible to predict who will be on a team’s roster from year to year. Hence, regardless of the circumstances, a team can never assume that a player will be coming back the following season. Hence, it was notable when USC quarterback Jayden Maiava revealed he will be back with the Trojans in 2025.

“This is the place to be,” Maiava told reporters when asked about his future following a bowl practice last week.

After transferring in from UNLV, Maiava started the final three games of the year for the Trojans. He finished the regular season completing 60.8% of his passes for 906 yards, seven touchdowns, and three interceptions, while also adding 49 yards and four scores on the ground.

Maiava’s return marks a breath of consistency for the Trojans. USC has already seen more than a dozen players enter the transfer portal since the conclusion of the regular season.

Maiava and the Trojans will conclude the 2024 season in the Las Vegas Bowl against Texas A&M on December 27. It will be important for Maiava to use this bowl game as a real education. Would it be great if Maiava excelled the way Miller Moss did in the 2023 Holiday Bowl? Sure it would. However, that game — as we saw in 2024 — didn’t guarantee that Moss would be an excellent quarterback. It’s more about learning, less about the stat line, for Maiava against Texas A&M. Maiava needs to grow into the leader USC will need him to be in 2025.

Lincoln Riley knows he needs to make the USC QB room better in 2025

Lincoln Riley is mapping out his plan for the 2025 quarterback room at USC, but the one thing which matters should be obvious to anyone paying attention.

USC football and Lincoln Riley are in an interesting spot at the quarterback position heading into 2025. Miller Moss, who started the first nine games of the season for the Trojans, announced his plans to enter the transfer portal earlier this week. With third stringer Jake Jensen also planning to transfer, USC has just one scholarship quarterback set to return next season: Jayden Maiava.

Maiava, who transferred to USC from UNLV ahead of the 2024 season, started the final three games of the regular season for the Trojans. He will presumably start USC’s bowl game as well, and will return as a redshirt junior next fall.

The Trojans also just signed Husan Longstreet, a five-star quarterback in the class of 2025. Longstreet will enroll a semester early at USC, and begin practicing with the Trojans leading up to the bowl game. He will look to compete for playing time as a true freshman in the fall.

With just two scholarship quarterbacks currently on the roster heading into the spring, USC will need to add depth at the position. On Wednesday, Riley confirmed that USC will look to add a player in the transfer portal at the position.

However, Riley also expressed confidence in the two quarterbacks currently on the roster. Based on the sound of his comments, it seems as though USC will look to add a depth piece at the position, rather than a high-profile commodity.

“We obviously have a ton of confidence in both [Maiava] and Husan,” Riley said. “We’re gonna put a lot of emphasis, a lot of reps, a lot of time into those two guys.”

While Maiava should seemingly be the front runner to win the job, USC’s quarterback competition will certainly be an interesting story to follow when spring practice rolls around.

USC can’t allow opponents to set school records in 2025

USC put multiple Notre Dame defenders in the school’s record books. Next year, other teams can’t fatten their historical achievements at USC’s expense.

USC football watched its two-game winning streak end in its final game of the regular season with a 49-35 loss against Notre Dame on Saturday while failing to cover as a 7.5-point home underdog. The year concluded on a fitting but frustrating sour note. Notre Dame set school records against USC. When a team is allowing its opponents to set records, that says a lot about the season USC had.

The Trojans went pound-for-pound against the No. 5 ranked Fighting Irish, being tied 21-21 up until midway through the third quarter. The offense then stalled and went down by two touchdowns by the end of the third, but started to mount a comeback with a 6-yard Ja’Kobi Lane touchdown to close the gap to 35-28.

It was at that point that quarterback Jayden Maiava fell apart dramatically, throwing back-to-back goal line pick sixes that happened to be two of the longest interception returns for touchdowns in Notre Dame history. A 99-yard pick six from cornerback Christian Gray, the fourth-longest in school history, was followed by a 100-yard pick six from safety Xavier Watts on the next possession, tied for the longest touchdown interception return in the Fighting Irish’s history.

The failure of the Trojans to execute late seemed to be a fitting end to their mishap of a season. They failed to take care of business and left many questions that will need to be answered by Lincoln Riley and company over the offseason.

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USC continued to find new ways to lose football games in 2024

USC was consistent in 2024 — consistent at finding different ways of allowing close games to slip away from its grasp.

Not much has gone according to plan for the 2024 USC football team. However, there is one thing that this year’s Trojans have actually been quite good at.

The 2024 USC Trojans are quite good at finding new ways to lose football games.

There was allowing a two-minute drill touchdown to a Michigan team with a running back at QB. There was the clock mismanagement at the end of regulation against Penn State and subsequently falling in overtime. There having a field goal that would have iced the game against Maryland blocked and the Terrapins instead driving down for the game-winning touchdown. There was the horrendous play calling on the goal line against Washington with a chance to take a late lead.

Saturday, there was throwing two pick sixes of 99 yards or more.

No, that is not a typo. With the Trojans trailing archrival Notre Dame by a touchdown late in the fourth quarter, quarterback Jayden Maiava was driving USC down the field for a potential tying score. However, a bad decision by Maiava led to his pass being picked off by Notre Dame’s Christian Gray, who ran it back 99 yards to give the Irish a 14-point lead.

With the Trojans in desperation mode, USC got the ball back, and Maiava drove them down the field once again. But the quarterback was pressured and forced into heaving up a bad throw, which was intercepted in the end zone by noted Trojan killer Xavier Watts. Sure enough, Watts ran the ball back more than 100 yards, icing a Notre Dame win and sending the Irish to the College Football Playoff.

For the Trojans, it was more of the same. Just when it was starting to look like USC might finally come through in a big moment, they found a new excruciating way to lose a football game.

The number of different ways that USC found to lose winnable games this season truly was remarkable. In an extremely disappointing season, you at least have to give the Trojans credit for that.

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Two Notre Dame cornerbacks run length of field for touchdowns

Lighting strikes twice for the Irish.

When Notre Dame was trying to hold off a pesky USC team, it needed something to make the job a lot easier with the Trojans driving. With only one touchdown separating the teams, a key defensive stop was a must.

The Irish found it when [autotag]Christian Gray[/autotag] picked off a Jayden Maiava pass just short of the goal line and got enough blocks in front of him to complete a 99-yard interception return for a touchdown.

Although the game essentially was decided on that play, the Irish decided they weren’t finished with their defensive fireworks. On the very next possession, [autotag]Xavier Watts[/autotag] intercepted another Maiava pass. This time, it was in the end zone, but the result was exactly the same as Watts returned the ball 100 yards for another pick-6, tying a program record.

The Irish are going to the College Football Playoff after defeating the Trojans, and you can see both of the aforementioned pick-6s here as part of the game highlights from ESPN:

Times are good for the Irish, and this is proof.

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Notre Dame Week 14 highlight: Xavier Watts seals the deal at USC with record-setting pick-six

Notre Dame seals the win thanks to Xavier Watts going 100 yards.

Although [autotag]Christian Gray’s[/autotag] 99-yard pick-six appeared to seal the deal for No. 5 Notre Dame against the USC Trojans, there was still enough time left that it was possible, if not likely, that the Trojans could get two scores and tie the ball game.

Fighting Irish safety [autotag]Xavier Watts[/autotag] said “nah” to all that.

Watts stepped in front of a [autotag]Jayden Maiava[/autotag] pass in the end zone and took it the entire 100 yards for a pick-six touchdown — the second one of that length in Notre Dame history.

It was one drive after Gray’s 99-yard pick-six.

Notre Dame will likely be headed to the College Football Playoff after the second pick-six all but snuffed out a USC comeback.

The Irish did concede another USC touchdown by playing soft in the final minute, but USC didn’t have enough time to get another two scores — which it would need just to tie.

Notre Dame safety Xavier Watts (0) celebrates picking up a Virginia fumble during a NCAA college football game at Notre Dame Stadium on Saturday, Nov. 16, 2024, in South Bend.

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USC’s big moment vs UCLA was a pass, but not by the quarterback

The fact that USC used a trick play to beat UCLA shows Lincoln Riley is at his best when he is creative, not predictable. Everyone can agree we haven’t seen enough of that.

For the past few weeks, much of the discussion surrounding USC football has surrounded the quarterback position. The UCLA football rivalry game offered a fascinating plot twist connected to big-play passing for the Trojans.

Following the loss to Washington, head coach Lincoln Riley elected to bench starter Miller Moss in favor of UNLV transfer Jayden Maiava. Through two games, the move has shown mixed results. Maiava has not exactly lit the world on fire, but he has played well enough for the Trojans to defeat both Nebraska and UCLA.

On Saturday night at the Rose Bowl, USC’s biggest play of the game was indeed a pass. It just wasn’t thrown by Maiava.

Midway through the third quarter, the Trojans trailed 13-9, and had not been able to get much going offensively. So Riley decided to pull one out of his bag of tricks.

Facing second down and 4 at the UCLA 43 yard line, Maiava took the snap and threw a backwards screen to wide receiver Makai Lemon. Lemon caught the ball and dropped back to pass himself, delivering a 39-yard dart to Ja’Kobi Lane, setting USC up with first and goal at the UCLA 4.

If the play looked at all familiar to you, that’s likely because the New England Patriots pulled off a similar trick nearly a decade ago in the AFC Divisional Playoffs against the Baltimore Ravens, with former college QB Julian Edelman playing the role of Lemon.

Following Lemon’s big throw, the Trojans punched the ball into the end zone on the next play to take a lead that they would not relinquish the rest of the night.

The play had a huge outcome on USC’s win probability. Prior to Lemon’s double pass, the Trojans had just a 37.6% chance to win the game, per ESPN analytics. After that play, it jumped to 58.6%.

We will never know what would have happened in the game had the trick play not been successful. But given how poorly the Trojans’ offense had looked prior, it was undeniably their most important one of the night.

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Woody Marks continues to show that he is USC’s best offensive player

Woody Marks continues to deliver for USC. In a lost season with so many frustrations and failures, Marks has been a clear shining light for the Trojans.

For the past week, the majority of the attention surrounding USC football has been dedicated to the quarterback position. With head coach Lincoln Riley opting to replace Miller Moss with Jayden Maiava prior to Saturday’s game against Nebraska, Maiava’s play was under a microscope the entire afternoon. On Saturday, however, we were treated to a reminder that the Trojans’ best offensive player is neither Moss, nor Maiava, nor any quarterback. Rather, it is star running back Woody Marks.

Against Nebraska, Marks delivered yet another impressive performance, carrying the ball 19 times for 146 yards. In addition, he caught six passes for 36 yards.

Marks has now gone over 100 yards rushing in six of USC’s ten games this season. On Saturday, he became the first Trojan to record 1,000 rushing yards in a season since Ronald Jones in 2017. (We should point out that Travis Dye was well on his way to surpassing the mark in 2022 prior to suffering a season-ending injury against Colorado with multiple games left in the season.)

Marks’s best play of the day came in the biggest moment. With under six minutes remaining in the game and USC leading 21-20, the Trojans faced a 4th and 1 from the Nebraska 47 yard line.

Marks decided to put the team on his back and take matters into his own hands. He cut through the defense and burst down the sideline for a 34-yard gain, giving the Trojans a first down at the Nebraksa 13 yard-line. Four plays later, USC was in the end zone with a much-needed insurance touchdown that ultimately put the game out of reach.

On paper, that drive will go down as having ended with Maiava touchdown run. But don’t get things twisted: By far the most important play on that drive (and arguably of the game) belonged to Marks.

With the game in the balance, Lincoln Riley put the ball in the hands of his best offensive player. And boy, did he deliver.

Obviously, quarterback is the most important position in not just football, but in all of sports. It is pretty much impossible to win in today’s day and age without a good signal-caller.

But even in today’s era of pass-happy attacks and spread offenses, running backs still matter. As we were reminded on Saturday, the Trojans have a pretty darn good one.

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Jayden Maiava played well enough to win, but turnovers are cause for concern

There was a lot of good and a lot of bad for Jayden Maiava. The main thing to remember is that this was only his first start. Improvement should occur.

On Saturday, USC quarterback Jayden Maiava made his first start in Cardinal and Gold when the Trojans took on Nebraska. As expected with any new starting QB, Maiava’s performance was a mixed bag. There were some very high highs, but also some very low lows.

Overall, Maiava played a solid game. He completed 25 of 35 passes for 259 yards and three touchdowns, while also adding another score on the ground.

However, he also had two horrible turnovers, both of which, to put it bluntly, were simply inexcusable plays. The two turnovers essentially handed 10 points to a Nebraska team that was struggling offensively, keeping the Cornhuskers in the game.

On USC’s second possession of the game, Maiava threw a brutal interception to old friend Ceyair Wright in which there were no receivers anywhere near the ball. Wright returned the pick 45 yards for a touchdown, giving Nebraska its first points of the game.

Later on, with the Trojans leading 21-17 in the third quarter, Maiava had a bad fumble on a rushing attempt deep inside USC territory. Nebraska got a field goal off the turnover, cutting the deficit to one point.

With the game on the line in the fourth quarter, however, Maiava came through when it mattered most. With the Trojans leading 21-20 with a little over 10 minutes left, Maiava led USC on a 13-play, 84-yard touchdown drive that ate up 7:39 of clock. Ultimately, that insurance proved to be enough, as the Trojans held on for a 28-20 victory.

Overall, outside of the two turnovers, Maiava played fairly well. While there is certainly a lot that needs to be cleaned up, Maiava and the Trojans will look to build off the performance heading into next week’s rivalry matchup against UCLA.

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USC QB coach Luke Huard visits notable recruit Friday night

If Julian Lewis bolts for Indiana or Colorado, getting Husan Longstreet to flip from Texas A&M could prove to be very crucial for USC.

On Friday evening, Jarrett Perez of 247Sports reported that USC football quarterbacks coach Luke Huard was in attendance at Corona Centennial High School, checking out five-star quarterback Husan Longstreet.

Per On3 Consensus’s rankings, Longstreet is the number 23 overall player in the Class of 2025. He is also the number four quarterback and the number two player in the state of California.

Longstreet is currently committed to Texas A&M. Over the past few weeks, however, rumors have begun to fly that he could potentially flip his commitment to USC.

The Trojans have had five-star 2025 quarterback Julian Lewis committed since last year. However, Lewis has taken numerous visits to other schools even after committing to USC, and the general vibe is that there is a good chance he winds up elsewhere.

USC’s quarterback situation for next year is still very much up in the air. The Trojans have just two quarterbacks on their 2024 roster who have thrown a pass at the FBS level: Miller Moss and Jayden Maiava. However, there is a good chance that at least one of the two will transfer this offseason, if not both.

While it will depend on how the last three games go with Maiava replacing Moss as the starter, it is likely that USC will be looking for at least one quarterback in the transfer portal this offseason. While the odds of a true freshman coming in and winning the starting job right away are slim, it is certainly not an impossible scenario given USC’s current status at the position.

College football’s early signing period for high school recruits begins on December 4, less than three weeks away.

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