No. 13 USC finds its identity in 38-21 thrashing of Wisconsin

LOS ANGELES — For years, biding his time in the deep sand of USC’s quarterback room, Miller Moss has internalized a constant message preached by his head coach.

A team, Lincoln Riley would tell the group, looks to its quarterback for their identity.

For an entire half, in Saturday’s home opener against Wisconsin, 13th-ranked USC looked like a team unmoored in every possible facet. Coverages were blown. Punts were muffed. Offensive-line assignments were blown, passes were dropped, Moss himself was picked off on an ill-advised throw, and USC walked into the tunnel – on their own turf – to the squawks of boo-birds.

Riley has preached another message too, though, over the years to his room. Show him a soft team, and he’ll show you a soft quarterback. Show him a tough team, and he’ll show you a tough quarterback.

And USC continued to find itself against Wisconsin behind Moss’ toughness. A quarterback who stood firm in USC’s quarterback room for two years standing in tall Saturday for two quarters, lofting up one-on-one balls built on sheer trust in his young receivers. He drove an early momentum shift, and USC’s defense made massive second-half adjustments to do the rest, putting Wisconsin away in a 38-21 win and scoring 28 unanswered.

“I think that’s our identity this year is – no matter what happens, man, we’re not going to ever lay down,” linebacker Mason Cobb said postgame.

Moss had been laid down, and laid out, on blitzes for two weeks, his offensive line having its fair share of growing pains. But he led two pivotal second-half touchdown drives, relying on sophomore Ja’Kobi Lane for a go-get-it  lob to cap the first and relying on sophomore Duce Robinson’s sure hands to cap the second. And on a fourth-quarter drive with a three-point lead, he relied on himself, pulling away a handoff to Woody Marks and dashing towards the end zone from the 7-yard line.

Throwing his back into a defender, Marks caught the end of Moss’ run. He knew Moss had it in him, Marks smiled. But not like this.

As Wisconsin’s All-Big-Ten safety Hunter Wohler approached, Moss planted, extended his right arm, and spun off a diving tackle attempt. As another Wisconsin defender approached, Moss took flight, twisting through enemy arms like the spinning top in “Inception” and landing across the plane in a true dream of a play.

“That,” Marks beamed postgame, “was crazy.”

Moss came up slow, staggering off to the medical tent, emerging a few minutes later. Postgame, he was asked – was he OK?

“Yes,” Moss responded.

“You go flying,” he added, asked to elaborate, “you see things sometimes.”

He’d seen plenty, this day. USC (3-1, 1-1 Big Ten) was primed for an exorcism Saturday, a chance to shed a week and a year’s worth of frustration in front of an announced sold-out crowd at the Coliseum. Motivation was there, for the taking, coming off a heartbreaking loss to Michigan. Motivation was there, for the taking, with the return of Alex Grinch, the much-maligned defensive coordinator making his return to the Coliseum as Wisconsin’s safeties coach.

They came away haunted, in the first half, a laundry list of unforced errors setting off jeers in USC’s Big Ten home opener. In the first quarter, after a dot of a first-drive touchdown ball from Moss to Lane, Wisconsin receiver Vinny Anthony responded by dusting USC cornerback Jacobe Covington for a 63-yard score.

It got much worse. Moss was picked off. Branch misplayed a punt. USC tackle Elijah Paige and left guard Emmanuel Pregnon attempted to block the same Wisconsin rusher on one second-quarter play, and Moss got crunched in a forced-fumble sack. He lay spread-eagle, for a moment, USC stunned with a 21-10 deficit in a first half in which everything that could possibly go wrong did.

“On offense, we was driving the ball, and then we’d have a bad play,” Marks described, postgame. “And then that bad play would lead to another bad play. So, we had to get out of that and get out of our heads.”

They did so, in the halftime locker room. Riley deadpanned his team’s second-half adjustments were the result of “a really, really good speech.” In reality, coaches largely let the players speak. This wasn’t them, defensive players affirmed, a unit suddenly struck by coverage busts not-quite-before-seen under defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn. They would go out to start the second half, defensive end Jamil Muhammad described, and needed to set the tone.

Tone set, emphatically. After Wisconsin (2-2, 0-1 Big Ten) muffed a punt early in the frame and Moss hit Lane for his second touchdown of the day, USC didn’t allow a point in the second half, and gave up a total of 82 yards across two periods. Safety Kamari Ramsey, a consistent playmaker in Lynn’s scheme, came up with massive consecutive fourth-down and third-down stops in the third quarter to shut down Badger drives.

“Fourth-and-short, we know it’s going to be physical ball, so we know we got to nut up and make the play,” Ramsey said postgame as the room burst into laughter.

Lane had a coming-out party, punctuated by a third-quarter drive where he and Moss mind-melded, finishing with 10 catches for 105 yards. Robinson’s score put USC up three, and Moss put the finishing touches on himself, going 30-of-45 for 308 yards, accounting for four total touchdowns.

“Man, you see him smacked, get back up, and throw touchdowns,” said Cobb postgame, who put the game thoroughly to bed with a 55-yard fourth-quarter touchdown return of a tipped interception. “And, like I said, man, we’re a team that’s just going to keep swinging.”