When No. 17 USC football took its second loss of the season in mid-October against its No. 9-ranked rival Notre Dame, its back was pushed against the wall. Needing to win out to make the College Football Playoff despite a multitude of injuries and staring down one of the hardest parts of their schedule, many would have counted out the Trojans. But the 2025 team and Head Coach Lincoln Riley had something to prove.

“Tougher. More resilient,” redshirt senior linebacker Eric Gentry said Saturday when asked what changed from the year before. “Mic drop.”

USC (9-3, 7-2 Big Ten) was caught flat-footed in all five of its ensuing games, trailing at halftime in four of them, including against a spiraling, unranked UCLA (3-9, 3-6) team on Saturday. But, just like the Trojans did in three of the four games before, they turned up in the second half, holding their crosstown rivals scoreless and bolting to a 29-10 win for the Victory Bell in a momentum-building victory.

“We’ll have better teams here in the future than this team, but I don’t know if we’ll have a more important team,” Riley said in a postgame news conference. “We’ll look back when things are really, really good here, and this will be one of the ones that everybody will point to. I promise you that’s going to happen.”

Though questions still remain about whether some of USC’s top talent, including junior wide receivers Makai Lemon and Ja’Kobi Lane, redshirt junior quarterback Jayden Maiava, and Riley, will stay with the program next year, the season was a step in the right direction. The rivalry win that secured a perfect 7-0 season record at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum was the cherry on top.

“That is the Trojan standard,” Maiava said in a postgame news conference.

Trojan stars shine against Bruins; will they be back?

Despite not starting the game for team disciplinary reasons, both Lemon and Lane made major contributions to USC’s comeback down the stretch. Lemon’s only catch of the game was a 32-yard touchdown grab with a defender in his face to give the Trojans a 14-10 lead in the third quarter, while Lane ended up leading USC’s receivers with 52 yards on three receptions that helped lead late scoring drives.

“There was a violation of a team policy,” Riley said when asked why neither of his star receivers played in the first quarter. “That was the decision that was made.”

Though it was Lemon’s second-worst single-game performance of his potential Biletnikoff Award-winning season — an honor given to the best wide receiver in college football that Lemon is one of three finalists for — his likely first-round NFL draft stock is already solidified thanks to his Big-Ten-leading 79 receptions, 1,158 receiving yards and 11 touchdowns. While Lane was saddled with injuries for part of the season, his 745 yards and multiple impressive acrobatic grabs have also earned him NFL buzz.

Neither has publicly commented on whether they will declare for the NFL Draft.

When asked about his future plans after the game, Maiava, who put together one of the best performances of his stellar season Saturday, avoided a direct answer, saying he has been focused on USC’s season. 

Without Lemon and Lane early on, Maiava, who threw for 257 yards on 21-of-29 passing, spread the ball around, completing passes to nine different targets, all of whom caught at least one pass of 10 yards or more. Overall, Maiava leads the Big Ten in passing yards with 3,431 and is top four in most major categories, including his 23 touchdowns and 159.5 passer rating. 

“[I will] focus on enjoying this win with my loved ones and my teammates,” Maiava said. “That’s where I’m at right now.”

Riley has publicly said multiple times over the last few weeks that he intends to stay at USC, though his name was linked to the now-filled opening at Florida by multiple media outlets. He also alluded to plans for the future of the program at multiple points during Saturday’s news conference, including praising the Trojan fans who helped USC to its second-highest home attendance of the season at 69,614.

“Los Angeles is a place that people aren’t going to show up just because. You have to win,” Riley said. “You have to give them something. When you do, there’s no sports town better. Tonight and multiple times throughout this season was an example of that.”

Defense, O-line come up clutch despite injuries

On top of its impacted receiver room, USC also had to play its final regular-season game without multiple key pieces, including three starting offensive linemen and both of its starting safeties.

Redshirt junior center Kilian O’Connor, sophomore left tackle Elijah Paige and junior right guard Alani Noa were all out with injuries, though two of their replacements — redshirt freshman Kaylon Miller and redshirt sophomore Micah Banuelos — have proven themselves as potential starting options for next year after filling in for injured players at multiple points this season. 

Overall, the Trojan front did a solid job, giving up two sacks, three quarterback hits and three tackles for loss.

Despite being without both redshirt senior safety Bishop Fitzgerald, whose five interceptions are among the most in college football, and redshirt junior safety Kamari Ramsey, the USC defense held Bruin redshirt sophomore quarterback Nico Iamaleava to a middling performance where he completed 27-of-38 passes for 200 yards and a touchdown on a 59.4 quarterback rating.

“If we have different guys down offensively, [we need] to win different ways and have different people rise up if we have injuries; that’s what really good teams do,” Riley said as the Victory Bell rang in the background postgame. “This team did that.”

Young guns stand out in rivalry bout

Also filling in as a part of battered units were two second-year Trojans in sophomore defensive tackle Jide Abasiri and redshirt freshman running back King Miller, who both made big impacts late in the game.

Miller, whose 873 rushing yards are seventh best in the Big Ten despite not taking over as USC’s starter until midway through the week-six game against Michigan, capped off the Trojans’ opening scoring drive with a touchdown and later added a second score to further extend their lead in the fourth. His 124-yard game was his fourth game with 100 or more yards as a starter and seventh above 70 in eight games.

Lifelong USC fan Miller said his 41-yard fourth-quarter touchdown against UCLA was in his top two favorite scores of his young career, alongside his first collegiate score.

“I’ll remember that one for a long time for sure,” Miller said in a postgame news conference. “That Victory Bell, it’s something special.”

On a defensive line filled with multiple strong underclassmen, it was Abasiri who stood out Saturday after his crucial third-quarter, third-down sack of Iamaleava pushed UCLA out of field goal range and forced a punt that later resulted in Lemon’s touchdown.

Abasiri’s sack, USC’s first of the game, also sparked an uptick in pressure that resulted in three more sacks, one of which was assisted by Abasiri, during the rest of the game.

Though he finished the season on a down note, missing both of his field goal attempts that allowed UCLA to have the lead at halftime, redshirt freshman kicker Ryon Sayeri completed his perfect 47-for-47 extra point record in the regular season, and will hope to bounce back after doubling his missed field goal total against the Bruins.

Now, USC will await its bowl draw as it sits on the sideline of conference championship weekend, hoping to reach the 10-win mark for the second time in the Riley era. 

Multiple experts have predicted that the Trojans will end their season at the Valero Alamo Bowl, contractually a meeting between second-choice Big 12 and Pac-12 teams. However, because the Pac-12 has been reduced to just two programs, former conference member USC may slot into the game and face a team like No. 11 BYU (11-1, 8-1 Big 12) or No. 13 Utah (10-2, 7-2 Big 12).

Before bowl announcements, though, the NCAA’s Early Signing Period for football will take place from Wednesday to Friday, which will likely see many of the 34 prospects currently in USC’s No. 1-ranked class officially sign to Riley’s squad. The Trojans currently hold commitments from 18 four-star and 15 three-star recruits as a part of the class that is led by five-star offensive tackle Keenyi Pepe.