Lincoln Riley and USC sweated out a 43-41 overtime win over Arizona late Saturday night.

The Trojans started slow and battled back with a chance to win it in regulation, but botched the game-winning field goal. They went on to win in triple overtime over an Arizona team that has won just 1 game against Power 5 competition.

41 points is the most Arizona has scored all season, and 28 (their total in regulation) is the most they’ve scored against a Power 5 opponent. It’s fair to say the Trojans defense played better to end than it did to start, but it was still far from a championship effort.

And still, Riley told reporters postgame that he believes the Trojans defense took “great steps” Saturday afternoon.

“I thought we took some great steps. Again, when you go down 17-0, you get tested right there internally. Do you really believe? Are guys ready to really fight? As Jamil (Muhammad) said and I’ve said before, your culture gets tested quick, and the defense is what got us going. Defense is what won this football game. It got us going in the beginning down 17-0 and closed it against a play that they’ve been running well all night. Closed it with a huge TFL to win the game, so I’m proud of those guys. We’re gonna get better. Missed a lot of pieces tonight. Even as the game went on, guys got in there and responded. So we’ll keep growing and I’m proud of their fight tonight.”

By just about all metrics, USC has one of the less effective defenses in the Pac-12. The Trojans are allowing 421 yards per game and 5.72 yards per play, which sits at 10th and 9th in the conference, respectively.

The offense may be stout, but as it was last season it’s hard to gauge how great the Trojans can be without a better unit on that side of the ball.

It’s about time to put up or shut up, too. USC still has Oregon and Washington on their schedule, not to mention Notre Dame and Utah.