USC held on in Boulder, surviving a furious comeback attempt from Colorado, to win a 48-41 game and move to 5-0 on the season.

It was not pretty, and the Trojans’ defense became a major talking point as a result of the way the game ended. Afterward, Lincoln Riley met with reporters to asses the poor second half, his defensive coordinator, and more.

Here’s everything Riley said:

Opening Statement

“Fired up to get to win. Guys played a really good first half, best first half we played all year against a good opponent and a tremendous atmosphere. We give Colorado and their fans, everybody, a lot of credit. It was a really tremendous road atmosphere, even when we got up they kept it loud in there and I felt like they kind of kept their team in it in a lot of ways.

“Didn’t play a very good second half on any of the three sides. Penalties, obviously, we had one turnover, missed tackles, we did the things that you don’t do when you’re trying to finish out a good opponent on the road. So, excited about the good, a lot that we’ve got to correct which, that’s college football, that’s how it goes. Plenty to correct. I am excited about I thought our operation and response on the road and some of what we learned last week showed up and we did several things on both sides much better, but obviously, we’ve got a lot of work to continue to do.

“We’re going to own the win, we’re going to own the mistakes, we’re going to own the good, we’re going to go back to work and get ready to get back home in the Coliseum.”

On why Colorado got back into the game

“They made plays and we kind of didn’t. We had opportunities on all three sides, we had opportunities to finish some plays offensively, we had opportunities to get the quarterback down, we had opportunities to tackle hitches for a 5-yard gain — the things that we did in the first half. Listen, when you stop doing that, especially on the road against a team that has some talent like they do, they’re going to make a run and they did and so it’s self-inflicted errors.

“We give them credit, they made some really tremendous, competitive plays, a couple of plays where our guys are right there and they made the plays. A lot of times when you have two good teams and really good individual players out there, that’s what it comes down to, those competitive plays and we certainly didn’t make as many and had a lot of mental errors in the second half, so a lot to work on.”

On facing some of the same defensive issues as a year ago

“It’s not really the same issues. I don’t I don’t agree with it. I feel like even right now when something doesn’t go our way … it doesn’t look like last year. Not to a trained eye. Not to a coach. We’ve still got plenty to correct. There are two things today that absolutely, when we weren’t good, killed us and that was we didn’t do a good job of keeping the quarterback in the pocket because really, we were suffocating them. I mean, that gave them life. That drive right before half gave them life. We were doing everything really well. He (Shedeur Sanders) gets outside of the pocket, makes a few plays, and then to give a quarterback confidence, there’s nothing like being able to throw a 7-yard hitch route up there and there’s a couple of those that went 30 40-plus. One went longer than that. You’ve got to own those things, we have to be better at them and those are plays that we didn’t make, but no, it doesn’t look like last year. There’s a lot that’s improved and we’ve got to obviously put it all together.”

On why Colorado was able to run with success against USC and why USC struggled to run

“They obviously RPOed us some in the run game. They did commit to it a lot more than they have in the previous games. I’ll have to go back and look at the tape but they put you in some of those positions where it’s either going to be one-on-one on the perimeter if you get those extra hats to the run game or you’re going to give them potentially favorable numbers in the box and you’ve got to be able to control the line of scrimmage and make some of those. We had some missed tackles in the backfield, a couple of times where they came out that we didn’t get the apt out. I give them credit, they were a lot more patient and stayed with it more than they had certainly in previous games and I thought they did a good job of staying with it even when we got way up.

“Running the ball, we weren’t great on the offensive line, I didn’t think. We didn’t play our best game up front. We missed a couple of holes. I didn’t think I called it very well in the run game, so it was just not a very good effort by the o-line, the backs, or me.”

On whether he still has trust in Alex Grinch

“Yes, I do.”

On how much it means to keep their lead in this environment

“You’d obviously love to finish it and separate it more but you put yourself in those moments and you get used to the adversity a little bit as a team because it’s coming. It’s coming, you never know exactly what week it’s going to be where you’re not at your best and I think the guy’s going through some of this together, especially with our roster continuing to change over quite a bit right now is really important.

“Like I said, listen, this is road football, and this is a tremendous atmosphere, we’re a team that gets circled every single week and to come to win these on the road, you go find a way because I promise you at the end of the year, nobody’s gonna look back on this and care, right? They’re gonna look back and see it was a dub and hopefully we can keep stacking those up.”

On what he saw from De’Jon Benton today.

“I’m still mad at him for the last penalty, so I’m trying to block that out of my mind. He was active, I noticed him in the backfield quite a bit. I’m proud of that kid. That’s one of the kids in our program that you point to in terms of the culture that you’re building.

“I don’t have a hard time saying that De’Jon, when we got here, I didn’t know if he was going to make it. The rigors of the program, the demands, the accountability, I didn’t even know if he would make it academically – not because of his capability, but he just hadn’t quite found himself yet. We had a very up-and-down year with him. A lot of hard and tough love, some moments where he wavered, but man, I’ve been really proud of him as of late.

“It’s funny, when you kind of get all your life in order — all of a sudden his grades are good, he’s on time for stuff, he’s playing good ball, he’s starting to climb, he’s battled back from some injuries. He’s one of the guys that you point to, especially being one of the guys that were holdovers, right, like not somebody that we brought in that has really latched on to it. It has been really cool to see his transformation.”