Lincoln Riley knows his USC defense fell apart in Week 5 despite a 48-41 win over Colorado. For much of that game, the Trojans were in control but surrendered 20 unanswered points as the game became interesting.

During his Tuesday media session, Riley was asked to compare this season’s defense to the unit from a season ago. The Trojans surrendered 29.2 points per game last season and are still allowing 24.2 points per game through the 5-0 start in 2023.

Despite the numbers, Riley still sees some areas where USC is clearly better this year.

“First off, we’ve been able to generate consistent pass rush from all levels of the defense,” said Riley. “I think we’re better from a blitzing standpoint, from a linebacker position and we certainly have better guys up front, both outside and on the interior that can create havoc, that can get in the backfield and create TFLs. That’s been a big difference.

“The second has been the run lanes. We’re a little bigger, thicker stronger inside so when things have popped this year, when we’ve given up a run, it just doesn’t look the same. It’s not been because guys are getting just moved off the ball… It’s just a sturdier front overall.”

Riley went on to say those are the biggest overall differences. However, he also believes USC is putting together some stretches this fall that the Trojans were simply incapable of putting together a season ago.

Now, the task is for the unit to get those stretches to reach a full game instead of just 2.5 quarters of dominant play like was seen vs. Colorado.

“I think those have been the biggest differences honestly. I think we’ve busted less, we’ve played some stretches of ball this year that frankly I don’t know if we were capable of playing last year, to be honest,” Riley explained. “We’ve gotta put it together, we can’t just dominate a good offense for 2.5 quarters like we did the other day, we’ve got to do it for 4. That’s our expectation.”

The 41 points given up to Colorado were by far the worst performance of the season, but the Trojans have still allowed 28+ 3 times before we hit October. USC will get a matchup with Arizona this week to try and take another step forward.