USC Football Notes: The latest at LT, Domani Jackson's debut and more
Notes on the left tackle situation, Domani Jackson's debut, takeaways from Oregon State and preparing for ASU.
usc.rivals.com
USC coach Lincoln Riley said injured left tackle Courtland Ford could have played Saturday at Oregon State, but he indicated the redshirt sophomore still wasn't 100 percent after injuring his ankle or foot in Week 2.
As a result, redshirt senior Bobby Haskins made his second straight start while playing all 73 snaps in the 17-14 win.
"Courtland was available. He was kind of right on the edge. By the time we made the game-time decision, we thought in a perfect world Bobby could go the whole way in this one, we think he's ready to do it. We think Courtland's right on the edge of really getting back to being himself," Riley said. "So it was like, hey, if Bobby can take all these, Courtland gets another week, we feel like Courtland will be closer to 100% this week. And I think that's the case. Bobby came out of there really health, did some really good things. And then Courtland's back to 100% now, so mission accomplished."
What Riley didn't comment on is what the plan will be at the position moving forward.
Ford started the first two games at left tackle but split reps evenly with Haskins, who has since played all but 6 snaps the last two weeks.
Haskins received by far his best game grade of the season from PFF -- an above average 77.3 -- for his work at Oregon State. Per PFF, he allowed just 1 pressure over 44 pass-blocking snaps after yielding 4 the week prior when he had some clear struggles against Fresno State.
"I need to be more consistent, I think that's the biggest thing," Haskins said of his self-assessment through four games. "There's a lot of technique stuff I need to clean up and just being more consistent overall."
Haskins had appeared to injure his right shoulder in Week 3, coming out for those 6 snaps that were filled by redshirt freshman Mason Murphy, but speaking after practice Tuesday he downplayed any lingering issues.
"Ah, everybody is [playing through things]. It's really nothing out of the normal. You know what I mean, it's football. Everybody's banged up, everybody's got bumps and bruises and you just push through it," he said.
With his improved performance Saturday, Haskins' season PFF grade is up to 69.5 while Ford is at a 61.6 for the season. Yet, Ford has allowed only 1 pressure in 35 pass-blocking snaps, per PFF, while Haskins is up to 7 over 119 passing snaps. Neither has been charged with a sack, though it looked to the untrained eye like Haskins had some culpability on a couple of QB Caleb Williams' sacks in Week 3.
Haskins, the grad transfer from Virginia, also has the better isolated run-blocking grade from PFF -- 69.7 to Ford's 63.6.
He was asked if he saw Ford's absence the last two games as his opportunity to seize control of the job full-time.
"Every time you go on the field it's an opportunity to prove yourself. I didn't really look at it any differently than any other game," he said. "Anytime you're on the field, you're trying your absolute hardest to do your absolute best to help the team win."
He also emphasized that the entire offensive line unit works together during games with all 10 or 11 offering observations and input back on the sideline.
"I think we're getting better. I think we're getting a lot better. Communication, like I said earlier, is something that we're looking to continue to improve on. We watch on film and obviously we didn't put up as many points as we want. When we look at it on film we're one guy here, one guy there and it pops," Haskins said. "It's just making sure all five guys are doing their job on every play because [offensive line coach Josh] Henson always says you never know what play is going to be the play that can change the game, so we've got to treat them all like that."
Five-star CB Domani Jackson debuts
Five-star freshman cornerback Domani Jackson saw his first college action Saturday, playing 6 snaps on defense and 1 on the kick coverage unit.
Despite the limited action, which came in the first half, Jackson managed 2 tackles.
Jackson, who was slowed in the spring coming off knee surgery in the fall for a patellar injury, also missed significant time over the second half of fall camp due to an unspecified injury. He dressed out and warmed up with the team the last two games, and it would not be a surprise to see his opportunities increase moving forward.
"He's getting better, he's finally getting healthy. He did a good job responding. We gave him a little bit of a role the other night, or he earned a role and did a good job with it. So as he gets healthy and gets back on the field more, hopefully he can keep playing well and improving and build opportunities for himself," Riley said. "Because he is talented and it was good to see. It's his first game, you get in there in that kind of atmosphere and he made a couple of really important plays for us, had a couple big tackles and they tried to sneak the tight end out on a play and he had really disciplined eyes, which is good for a young guy in his first college football game to see it and recognize. So yeah, I was excited about how he started but just the beginning."
Aftereffects from the dramatic win at Oregon State
Riley was asked earlier this week during his appearance on Trojans Live whether he thought going through an experience like USC did Saturday night, rallying in the final minutes on the road in front of a loud opposing crowd, would bond his team even more moving forward.
"You can look at it two ways. If your team's not close, you don't win anyway, right? We're not sitting here with that win. Does going through experiences like that, does it bond you together even more? I think certainly it can and I think it will our team. I mean, it was a real excited locker room after the game. Guys were generally happy for each other, and I think they understood even though we didn't play our very best as a team fully, we had to gut it out and we were able to do that," Riley said. "I think they see more and more some of the things we've been pushing behind the scenes are starting to show results on Saturdays, and they're getting I think a little more reinforcement as we go along that these things do work and we've got to stay the course."
Missed opportunities
It was also clear that the Trojans' lackluster offensive performance overall was still eating at Riley to some degree.
He mentioned that by Monday night he had already rewatched the game "about five times."
"I hopefully don't have to watch it again for another 12 months," he said. "Yeah, there was, just agonizingly close. Just some of the small little things that we did better in the first three games that turned into huge plays that were -- there's so many you watch in that game that were just one tiny thing away from being huge game-changing, drive-changing plays that we just didn't make many of them in the first three quarters. We made our fair share in the fourth quarter, but yeah, we did the things that you can't do to play good offensive ball.
"We had crucial penalties, we had assignment busts. We admittedly didn't handle the crowd very well. It was loud, it was a little unexpected to be completely honest with the half-full stadium [due to construction]. ... [The Beavers] make you earn it. They didn't give us any gifts, and for a large part of the game we didn't play sharp enough to take advantage of some of the things that were certainly there."
That comment could answer fans' questions of why the Trojans didn't run the ball even more with the passing game struggling. If Riley felt throughout that they were close to connecting on big plays, that would explain his decision to stick with the passing game.
Preparing for Arizona State and an interim head coach
Every metric or bit of anecdotal evidence would suggest that USC should face a much lighter challenge this week from a 1-3 Arizona State team that has yet to beat an FBS opponent, that lost 30-21 to Eastern Michigan at home resulting in the firing of head coach Herm Edwards, and that was blown out by Oklahoma State and Utah.
The Sun Devils are now led by interim head coach Shaun Aguano, who was the team's running backs coach.
"A lot of times you switch some staff responsibilities around, different head man in charge, maybe different parameters of what they're doing, so I think you definitely have to be on high alert for anything that could change," Riley said of trying to prepare for the matchup.
"I think a little bit to what we were making the point going into Corvallis is just an understanding, when you sign up to play football at USC you're not always going to see the same team on tape that everybody else sees. You're not always going to get the same energy and effort. People are going to raise their game. Everybody either wants to play at USC or against USC, right? It's just one of those and it's just the way the world works. I think we've got to learn to anticipate that. We're going to get teams' best shots. We're going to get them to empty the playbook and do everything they possibly can, and I think our message to the team has been, yeah, you've got to be ready for all that certainly. You've got to understand the game, but let's make sure they get our best shot too."
