During his press conference on Thursday October 2, 2025, USC Football Head Coach Lincoln Riley shared several different ways the Trojans are looking to improve their secondary after their 34-32 loss to Illinois this past Saturday.
USC has one of the best offenses in college football but took their first loss of the season against the Illini because they allowed 502 total yards including 331 passing yards. Illinois had only 6 incompletions in the entire game. The secondary has been the weakest unit on the team generally so far this season.
First and foremost, Riley said they are “pushing” for true freshman defensive backs Alex Graham and RJ Sermons to be ready to play meaningful snaps in USC’s secondary.
“We want that to be able to happen sooner than later’,” Riley said.
Graham could play snaps at the nickel cornerback spot, allowing superstar safety Kamari Ramsey to play his natural position. Graham has sat out of every game so far this season because of an injury. Though, he recently returned to practice ahead of the Illinois game.
About Sermons, Riley said he has “incredible talent”.
“He’s going to be a really good player here, but he’s also battling not just the injury, but he wasn’t here until mid-July,” Riley said. “And not to mention, he’s a reclass guy who should still be in high school.”
DJ Harvey Challenged To Step Up
In his comments, Lincoln Riley also put the pressure on cornerback DJ Harvey to perform better in the rest of the season than he has in the first five games.
“His emergence in the next phase of the season will be important for us,” Riley said.
Riley also mentioned that USC will “need [Harvey’s] experience to show up.”
Harvey is a redshirt senior transfer who has spent two seasons at San Jose State and two seasons at Virginia Tech in his career.
Harvey starred at San Jose in 2024, recording 58 tackles (7 for loss including 2 sacks), 10 pass breakups, 4 interceptions and 1 interception touchdown in 12 games.
But in 2025 with USC, Harvey has only 5 total tackles to his name in 5 games. And his role is shrinking instead of growing.
Will USC’s Bad Performance Against Illinois Wake Them Up?
USC’s struggles against Illinois are particularly concerning because many fans fear the Trojans have regressed on the defensive side of the ball in their second season under D’Anton Lynn.
USC was a defense-first team in 2024, and that enabled them to remain competitive in most games despite their offensive struggles.
But in 2025, they have a generational offense again, and like in the 2022-23 under Lincoln Riley, the defense is letting them down again.
Now, to be fair, Kamari Ramsey missed USC’s loss to Illinois, and Coach Riley alluded to the fact that Ramsey was not the only player struggling with food poisoning symptoms.
But USC should still feel like it needs to clean things up.
During the off week, they are saying all of the right things. Redshirt senior safety transfer Bishop Fitzgerald said USC’s defense is “pretty motivated” after they let the team down against Illinois.
“We might’ve needed that loss to get our heads back on,” Fitzgerald said.
Riley also said the Trojans did a lot of fundamental defensive work during their off week, including block destruction and taking away the open air in the run game.
They just need that talk to manifest into performance two Saturdays from now against Michigan.
Trojan fans, do you think USC’s defense can rebound and put together a better performance the rest of the season?
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