Speaker 1: We got another bonus episode for you. Let you hear
Speaker 1: a little bit from some of the folks that we've
Speaker 1: gotten a chance to talk to here at Big ten
Speaker 1: Media Days, some stuff we just haven't had a chance
Speaker 1: to put in any other podcast speeds. Well, we have
Speaker 1: lots of great stuff for you all week long. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna give you some bonus coverage to let you hear
Speaker 1: from as many people as we possibly can. This week
Speaker 1: today's show, you're gonna get to hear from a little
Speaker 1: bit from USC head coach Lincoln Riley. And this is
Speaker 1: a big year for Lincoln Riley. Things have not necessarily
Speaker 1: gone as well or as quickly as he might have
Speaker 1: liked in his new job at USC, which is no
Speaker 1: longer a new job at USC, But you get the vibe,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna get to hear from him. You get
Speaker 1: the vibe that he thinks things might be on the
Speaker 1: upsling there for a whole lot of different reasons. But
Speaker 1: before we get into sort of the big picture stuff
Speaker 1: with USC, gonna drill down a little bit on the
Speaker 1: Ohio state specific stuff. There were just a couple questions
Speaker 1: about Ohio state. I'm gonna let you hear those first
Speaker 1: and then we can get into some of the broader stuff.
Speaker 1: But they are going up against Ohio State this ball.
Speaker 1: The Buckeyes visit the coliseum out in LA on Halloween
Speaker 1: this year. We don't have a game time. I think
Speaker 1: it is probably safe to say that's likely going to
Speaker 1: be a late afternoon game or potentially even early evening
Speaker 1: game out there in La. So a little bit of
Speaker 1: a personal history there as well between Lincoln Riley and
Speaker 1: the Buckeyes and a very very big game on tap
Speaker 1: for Halloween.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: No, I mean, I you know, we competed against them
Speaker 3: two of the years at OU my last year's OC
Speaker 3: and then my actually my second game as a head
Speaker 3: coach was in Columbus.
Speaker 2: That was a fun one.
Speaker 3: Hopefully we can recreate that a little bit more. Yeah,
Speaker 3: a lot of respect for the program obviously, coach you
Speaker 3: know Meyer was there at that time, and then Ryan
Speaker 3: took over. I remember I was having a few discussions
Speaker 3: when he took over, because, like you said, there was
Speaker 3: a lot of parallels between his situation at Ohio State
Speaker 3: and mine at Oklahoma at the time. But no, listen,
Speaker 3: it's one of the best programs of all time. You know,
Speaker 3: they've they've invested in that program, They've had a lot
Speaker 3: of great coaches. You know, their talent level seems to
Speaker 3: just stay. It's one of the steadiest.
Speaker 2: I would say, there's.
Speaker 3: Talent levels a year in our sport, you know, great
Speaker 3: place to go play, I mean, it's it's yeah, I mean,
Speaker 3: I've utmost respect for it, and I'm glad, yeah, glad
Speaker 3: we probably finally get to play them. It's it's been
Speaker 3: a while. We've gotten to play some of the others,
Speaker 3: like Michigan a couple of times and all that, and
Speaker 3: so it'll be fun, you know, them being at the Coliseum,
Speaker 3: two of the best programs of all time going at it,
Speaker 3: you know, I mean at that venue.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's that's it's pretty damn cool.
Speaker 1: You don't necessarily think of a team from Ohio and
Speaker 1: a team from California being real longtime rivals, But the
Speaker 1: Buckeyes and Trojans have played twenty four times already, a
Speaker 1: lot of those happening in the Rose Bowl Game. So
Speaker 1: this is a very very traditional rivalry between these two schools.
Speaker 2: The two schools, two programs, These.
Speaker 1: Are two programs that played a lot of very high profile,
Speaker 1: high stakes games over the years, a lot of them
Speaker 1: on New Year's Day. So this now as Big Ten
Speaker 1: Conference rivals, this is the first time these two teams
Speaker 1: will meet. This is kind of a new chapter in
Speaker 1: the rivalry, a little bit of a renewal of the rivalry.
Speaker 1: Tony Gerdaman asked him about sort of is this sort
Speaker 1: of starting a new tradition usc playing Michigan previously previously
Speaker 1: and now Ohio State, sort of taking the old rivalry
Speaker 1: and renewing it in a new place.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's some ways a renewal with some of the
Speaker 2: history of it.
Speaker 3: I think, uh, you know, and and and it's like
Speaker 3: maybe a renewal and a start at the same time,
Speaker 3: you know, and Michigan the last few years has kind
Speaker 3: of felt that way a little bit for us, you know,
Speaker 3: like this this one's.
Speaker 2: Got a little bit of juice behind it. You know.
Speaker 3: It's just those two, those two whether it's at the
Speaker 3: Big House or at the coliseum, those two programs walk
Speaker 3: onto the field and those two helmets walk on the field.
Speaker 3: It's like, damn, you know, like this is this is real,
Speaker 3: Like it's it's pretty cool. And I think everybody you know,
Speaker 3: kind of feels that. So I think we'll have that
Speaker 3: with several teams in the Big Ten, and obviously Ohio
Speaker 3: State's you know, a natural one because of the histories
Speaker 3: of both schools individually and together.
Speaker 1: All right, now, let's go to some of the other
Speaker 1: stuff that Lincoln Riley had to say, and he had
Speaker 1: some interesting soundbites. You're gonning to hear a bunch from
Speaker 1: him about a whole bunch of different topics. One of
Speaker 1: the things was the twenty four team college football playoff model. Now,
Speaker 1: it's easy to be cynical and look at Lincoln Riley
Speaker 1: and go, well, yes, the guy who has just barely
Speaker 1: missed the college football Playoff and who probably really desperately
Speaker 1: needs to make the college football Playoff. Yes, I'm sure
Speaker 1: he's in favor of letting more teams in the college
Speaker 1: football Playoff. But as you will hear him say here,
Speaker 1: he is definitely not the only one in the Big
Speaker 1: Ten who thinks that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's actually, you know, when you get a room of
Speaker 2: fifty coaches or whatever we have in this conference together, it's.
Speaker 3: Hard to get everybody to be like unanimous on something.
Speaker 3: This is something that our room has been unanimous on,
Speaker 3: and I think, you know, the Big ten has done
Speaker 3: a nice job of putting some facts in front of us,
Speaker 3: and I think for everybody out there that's maybe undecided
Speaker 3: or like, you know, trying to figure out where they
Speaker 3: stand on you know, how many teams should be in
Speaker 3: a playoff like and I know they put this out there,
Speaker 3: but like, look at every other major sport, right and
Speaker 3: look at the percentage of teams that have access, you know,
Speaker 3: to a playoff, and and I think it's it's an
Speaker 3: interesting lens to look at this at And I think,
Speaker 3: you know, college football is behind in that regard, like
Speaker 3: in any way, shape or form, and you're seeing some
Speaker 3: of the repercussions of that, especially the non conference scheduling
Speaker 3: being certainly the biggest, but I think there's others as well,
Speaker 3: And so I just think this is something that's not
Speaker 3: going to diminish the game, and in any way, having
Speaker 3: more teams in a tournament to determine a champion is
Speaker 3: not going to make it worse. You're gonna have more
Speaker 3: playoff games on college campuses, which are unbelievable. You're going
Speaker 3: to have better non conference matchups which preserve some of
Speaker 3: the traditions and rivalries and all the things that everybody
Speaker 3: loves about college football. Like I just I think it's
Speaker 3: time that that, you know, it should be the idea
Speaker 3: should be embraced. And I think more and more people
Speaker 3: are coming over to that, and I honestly believe it's
Speaker 3: just a matter of time.
Speaker 1: There is, of course, a trade off to everything. You
Speaker 1: get twenty four teams, you get more playoff teams, you
Speaker 1: get more playoff games. Sure, if you want that, that's great,
Speaker 1: but that means you're probably doing away with the conference
Speaker 1: championship games. That was something that Tony Petiti, the Big
Speaker 1: Ten commissioner, talked about on Tuesday here. So is that
Speaker 1: worth it? Is that a financially worth it trade off
Speaker 1: to potentially give away the conference championship games no longer
Speaker 1: have those in favor of bringing in all the other
Speaker 1: college football playoff games.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's definitely one of the discussions.
Speaker 3: You know, you lose, potentially lose the conference championship game.
Speaker 2: I know that.
Speaker 3: You know, obviously those are huge revenue drivers right now
Speaker 3: for these conferences, which matters in this day and age right,
Speaker 3: maybe a little bit more than it used to.
Speaker 2: But to think.
Speaker 3: That that could not be made up when you start
Speaker 3: to add in some of these playoff games. I know
Speaker 3: there's some mechanisms and that's easier than just you know,
Speaker 3: turning off one light switch and flipping on another. But
Speaker 3: I have a hard time believing that that couldn't be recruited,
Speaker 3: that these conferences can't just decide who the regular season
Speaker 3: champion is, you know, have your tiebreaker structure or whatever,
Speaker 3: and then let's get into the playoffs. And I think
Speaker 3: that I think when that happens, I think it'll become,
Speaker 3: you know, in some ways, like a little bit more
Speaker 3: like the NFL, right. I mean, people pay attention of
Speaker 3: who wins you know, the AFC this or the NFC this,
Speaker 3: but people really just pay attention to who wins the
Speaker 3: Super Bowl, right, who wins the big conference?
Speaker 2: Right? And I think we'll probably trend that way a
Speaker 2: little bit.
Speaker 1: This is definitely a year when USC needs to figure
Speaker 1: it out. They need to get over the hump for
Speaker 1: Lincoln Riley's long term job security. Obviously, getting to a
Speaker 1: twenty four team playoff would help him get into the playoff,
Speaker 1: but that's not going to happen this year, so they
Speaker 1: got to kind of figure that out on their own.
Speaker 1: So one of the what do they have to do well.
Speaker 1: You're gonna hear him talk about they got to win
Speaker 1: on the road. They gotta beat some good teams on
Speaker 1: the road. Here's the road schedule this year. They play
Speaker 1: at Rutgers, you figure they're probably okay. They're at Penn State,
Speaker 1: that might be a challenge, at Wisconsin, who knows what
Speaker 1: that's going to be this year, at Indiana that's going
Speaker 1: to be a challenge. And then they finish at UCLA,
Speaker 1: which that could be a tougher game than you think
Speaker 1: in the first year for Bob Chesney. So what do
Speaker 1: they have to do to get where they need to
Speaker 1: beat this season?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think the biggest areas that that that we
Speaker 3: have to improve, you know, I would say, I mean
Speaker 3: I think holistically as a team for us, the biggest thing,
Speaker 3: the number one thing for us is the ability to
Speaker 3: go win big games against really good teams on the road.
Speaker 2: Like that's the hardest thing to do in college football.
Speaker 3: That's those games are actually easier to win or harder
Speaker 3: to win than championship games or playoff games. You know
Speaker 3: those are you're still playing good teams there, but those
Speaker 3: are neutral. It's the toughest thing to do in college football.
Speaker 3: Once you can do that consistently, you can beat anybody.
Speaker 3: And you know, I think that's we've we've we've come
Speaker 3: along ways in terms of our ability to win at
Speaker 3: home and and and I think the home field advantage
Speaker 3: of the coliseums has gotten better and better each year.
Speaker 3: And you really fit Al did a lot last year.
Speaker 3: But that's kind of the next step for us, and
Speaker 3: it's a big step, and we obviously have some great
Speaker 3: opportunities coming up.
Speaker 1: He was asked about nil the transfer portal, some of
Speaker 1: the changes in college football, maybe bringing some changes to
Speaker 1: the sport, maybe bring more parody to the sport. This
Speaker 1: is one of these great answers where you don't have
Speaker 1: to read very far between the lines to understand what
Speaker 1: he's saying here at the beginning of it, where he
Speaker 1: talks about how things used to be and maybe what
Speaker 1: has changed there.
Speaker 3: It's a good question because there's a lot of parody
Speaker 3: right now, like there really is. I mean, there's so
Speaker 3: much more parody than there was. I mean, for a
Speaker 3: lot of different reasons. I've never been afraid to say it.
Speaker 3: I mean, obviously, you know, ten years ago, there was
Speaker 3: you know, one side of the world that was way
Speaker 3: different from everywhere else. Everybody can pay Now everybody's using
Speaker 3: rev share. But yeah, it's hard to imagine it not
Speaker 3: increasing it more. But there's so much more right now
Speaker 3: than there was a few years ago. Like it's kind
Speaker 3: of defying, like how we all look at college bar
Speaker 3: right now.
Speaker 1: This is one of these questions that coaches tend to
Speaker 1: be a little bit cagy in answering. They don't want
Speaker 1: to get too committal on any one direction. But you know,
Speaker 1: would he be in favor of somebody maybe control costs
Speaker 1: in terms of player player salaries or player income, you know,
Speaker 1: And he will say the word salary cap here, So
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not putting words in this word to say,
Speaker 1: you know, what does he think about the idea of
Speaker 1: a salary cap?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it probably depends on your you know, your own
Speaker 3: opinion of it, but I uh, I mean I would
Speaker 3: be in favor of it, I think, just to normalize it.
Speaker 2: I just h I've always been one like I just
Speaker 2: I don't want to have less.
Speaker 3: Than what somebody has, but I don't necessarily have to
Speaker 3: have more, Like you know, I just don't want to
Speaker 3: be as like some massive, massive disadvantage you know if
Speaker 3: you're trying to win a championship. But I will say this, like,
Speaker 3: despite maybe the perception outside, it.
Speaker 2: Has normalized a lot in the last few years.
Speaker 3: Now, let's not confuse that with being normal, but it
Speaker 3: has normalized, Like we there is a lot more structure,
Speaker 3: and there is a lot more process, and there's not
Speaker 3: so much crazy stuff going on. Like there's still some,
Speaker 3: but it ain't like a couple of years ago this
Speaker 3: thing people say everybody wants use the turn wild West.
Speaker 2: A couple of years ago it was like legit. Now
Speaker 2: it's it has steadied. A true salary cap would steady
Speaker 2: it even more.
Speaker 1: One of the things that you will learn at these
Speaker 1: events every year is coaches never want to set the
Speaker 1: expectations too high. Everyone's trying to manage their expectations a
Speaker 1: little bit because if you go out there and say
Speaker 1: we're gonna be the best team ever and then you're not, well,
Speaker 1: then you have sort of set yourself up for failure.
Speaker 1: Lincoln Riley, he was pretty confident about how things are
Speaker 1: looking for this year's team. He was asked to sort
Speaker 1: of put a comp on this year's team, maybe a
Speaker 1: team from his past that this one maybe reminded him
Speaker 1: of you're going to hear him talk about his twenty
Speaker 1: nineteen Oklahoma team. That was a team that had Jalen Hurts,
Speaker 1: the former Auburn or Alabama quarterback transfer. That team made
Speaker 1: the College Football Playoff, and that was in a four
Speaker 1: team college football playoff. So the fact that he was
Speaker 1: willing to put that comp on team and that tells
Speaker 1: you a lot about what he thinks. So here was
Speaker 1: his answer on that question.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you know there there's definitely there's definitely
Speaker 3: some parts of this team that kind of remind me
Speaker 3: a little of our our nineteen team at OU when
Speaker 3: we when we had we had an experienced quarterback, it
Speaker 3: was Jalen coming at the time. That was, you know,
Speaker 3: definitely one of the best defenses that we had there.
Speaker 3: We had a really good defense that year. Defensively kind
Speaker 3: of won a budd We won games a lot of
Speaker 3: different ways that year. And this team, again, it's you know,
Speaker 3: it's right here into July beginning of August, but like,
Speaker 3: this team feels.
Speaker 2: Like it's going to have that capability.
Speaker 3: You know that we're going to have some firepower on
Speaker 3: both sides, and I think I'm most interested to see
Speaker 3: is you know, our our lines of scrimmage, especially on
Speaker 3: the road in the big games, and then how our
Speaker 3: depth holds up. You know, we were just we had
Speaker 3: a pretty football team last year. We were just very different.
Speaker 3: Like if you look at us early season, mid season,
Speaker 3: and late season, it's almost especially from like early mid
Speaker 3: to mid late we were almost like two different football teams,
Speaker 3: like in a lot of ways. And when you get
Speaker 3: really good, that's not necessarily the case. Right, Injury, this
Speaker 3: or that happens, you're able that next guy's up and
Speaker 3: you just hardly even notice, right, And that's that's what
Speaker 3: you got to get to, especially with as long as
Speaker 3: these seasons are now and how long the playoffs are, Like,
Speaker 3: I mean, you may have I mean I saw some stats
Speaker 3: like Indiana's last year.
Speaker 2: I mean, you might have that one kind of generational.
Speaker 3: Year where you're just radically stay healthy and that's great.
Speaker 3: That typically does not happen, and I think how your
Speaker 3: roster is able to withstand that is like that's everything,
Speaker 3: And I you know, obviously I've sit up here hoping
Speaker 3: we stay healthy like crazy, but I feel like we
Speaker 3: can withstand a few and still be a pretty good
Speaker 3: team and not not change a lot.
Speaker 1: And then finally he was asked about his just level
Speaker 1: of confidence around the program on the whole, and you'll
Speaker 1: hear him talk about it. There's a lot of reasons.
Speaker 1: He feels pretty good about his program right now. Here
Speaker 1: or mentioned a new building. They just opened a new
Speaker 1: football facility about ten days ago. But it feels like
Speaker 1: the he feels pretty confident about his roster, feels pretty
Speaker 1: good about his program on the whole. This is a college,
Speaker 1: this is a coach who feels pretty good heading into
Speaker 1: the season.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just a it's a culmination of all
Speaker 2: of it.
Speaker 3: You know. It's a culmination of knowing that our our
Speaker 3: leadership is steady. It's a culminator. It's knowing that our
Speaker 3: nil is in a good place. It's knowing that we
Speaker 3: now reside in maybe the best football facility in the country.
Speaker 3: It's knowing the staff we brought together and the talent
Speaker 3: we have. And like I did, it's not I want
Speaker 3: to paint this picture like it's perfect, but like it
Speaker 3: is just so much more well equipped to win consistently
Speaker 3: right now. It's so it's so different, and that just
Speaker 3: so with that, a lot of my time and energy
Speaker 3: now goes into just the team winning. And that's again,
Speaker 3: just like I said before, we're all a product of
Speaker 3: our own experiences and the place I've been where we've
Speaker 3: won a lot.
Speaker 2: That's what it's felt like, like.
Speaker 3: The main thing was the main thing, and everything else
Speaker 3: is kind of handled. Like you ain't worried about all
Speaker 3: this other crap, right, You're just it's not crap.
Speaker 2: You have to have it to win. And if it's
Speaker 2: not fixed, you have to fix it. You can.
Speaker 3: If you ignore it, you know you'll probably have you know,
Speaker 3: you'll have something. There were some things ignored at this
Speaker 3: place for years. I mean that's why I was in
Speaker 3: the position it was when we came here. Like when
Speaker 3: you ignore it and neglect it, it'll bite you. But
Speaker 3: if you can get it to a point where it's
Speaker 3: healthy and running and operating a high level, then you
Speaker 3: can just put all your energy into the team and
Speaker 3: winning and coaching. And right now, if you if somebody
Speaker 3: were to take like a snapshot of the percentage of
Speaker 3: my time and where it's going, there's more time just
Speaker 3: going into our team and coaching than at any point
Speaker 3: that I've been at SC and by a not a
Speaker 3: small margin and that's again my experience tells me that's
Speaker 3: typically a precursor to some pretty good things.
Speaker 1: So you go a little bit from Lincoln Riley about
Speaker 1: the US Trojans again. Ohio State will play out in
Speaker 1: USC play out at the Coliseum on Halloween this year.
Speaker 1: That is going to be a very very big game
Speaker 1: for both teams, two teams expected to compete for college
Speaker 1: football playoff. For US, that game will probably go a
Speaker 1: long way towards determining which one gets there or whether
Speaker 1: they both get there. So there you go, there's a
Speaker 1: little update from Lincoln Raleigh. We will have much more
Speaker 1: coming up all week long from Big Ten media Days,
Speaker 1: planning plenty of bonus coverage for you as well.