In these late spring and early summer months, why not look at some film? The NFL draft is over. So is spring ball. June will be an important month for recruiting visits at USC, but a lot of the big headline-generating events on the sports calendar are behind us. We’re just two months from the start of summer camp leading into the late-August season opener against San Jose State. Then we’ll be off to the races for yet another college football season at USC.
We turned to former Trojans Wire staff writer Josh Webb for some film-room insights on Lincoln Riley’s plays and concepts.
So, what stands out, Josh?
“The Coordinator Project took a look at how Riley incorporates the counter, his run game, and how Riley could fare at USC with this play,” Webb began.
“The counter is something Riley loves to use, incorporating ample wrinkles and variations to punish teams later in games. As the video below shows, Riley loves to use pulling offensive linemen as both a tactical tool and a distraction. Like any good coach, Riley uses the foundations of these plays as a way to bake in numbers advantages regardless of what defensive alignment the opposition uses. It’s very reminiscent of the way Chip Kelly ran his offense at Oregon, but Riley’s offenses seem to struggle a lot less against top opponents than Kelly’s did.
“Riley will likely convince teams of his more aggressive traits. The Pac-12 is traditionally more aggressive in its approach. This flows from the Oregon era in which Chip Kelly would almost always go for it on fourth down. This led teams to go for it themselves just to keep pace. Over time, this morphed into a philosophy in which teams were aggressive all the time. Coaches within the Pac-12 will probably be more inclined to believe Riley has a similar mindset.”
Here’s the video and breakdown of the counter play:
[lawrence-auto-related count=1 tag=696090378]