No. 13 USC comes alive for 38-21 thrashing of Wisconsin

LOS ANGELES — For years buried in the deep sand of USC’s quarterback room, biding time until the ball fell into his hands, Miller Moss would internalize a consistent message preached by his head coach.

A team, Lincoln Riley would tell the group, looks to its quarterback for their identity.

For an entire half, in Saturday’s home opener against Wisconsin, USC looked utterly lost in every possible facet. Coverages were blown. Punts were muffed. Offensive-line assignments were blown, passes were dropped, Moss himself was picked off on an ill-advised throw, and USC walked into the tunnel – on their home turf – to a cacophony of boos.

But this USC team, Moss emphasized last week, is tough. And they are tough, in many ways, because of their veteran leader behind center, the kid who didn’t press Riley for snaps and didn’t run and entrenched himself at the center of his program. And after that listless first half, Moss absorbed blitzes and blows in the second half in firing lasers short and long, captaining 13th-ranked USC to a complete momentum shift in a 38-21 win over Wisconsin.

Sophomore wide receiver Ja’Kobi Lane had a breakout performance, often keeping USC’s offense afloat with 10 catches for 108 yards. Moss finished 30 of 45 for 308 yards, three touchdowns, one interception and one twisting fourth-quarter rushing touchdown to give the Trojans a 31-21 lead. On the subsequent drive, a tipped pass fluttered into linebacker Mason Cobb’s hands for his second interception of the year, the linebacker promptly whizzing 55 yards and tumbling into the end zone for the backbreaker.

This program was primed for an exorcism Saturday, a chance to shed a week and a year’s worth of frustration in front of an announced sold-out crowd at the Coliseum. His program had played a “C-level game,” as Riley put it, against Michigan the week prior, and yet fought valiantly in a 27-24 loss. Motivation was there, for the taking, coming off a heartbreaker. Motivation was there, for the taking, with the return of Alex Grinch, the much-maligned defensive coordinator making his return to the Coliseum as Wisconsin’s safeties coach. Motivation was there, for the taking, with Saturday pride, the program’s first Big Ten home opener.

They came away haunted, in the first half, by a laundry list of unforced errors that led to jeers at the Coliseum. In the first quarter, after a dot of a first-drive touchdown ball from quarterback Miller Moss to Ja’Kobi Lane, Wisconsin receiver Vinny Anthony responded by dusting USC cornerback Jacobe Covington for a 63-yard score.

Moss was picked off. Branch misplayed a punt. USC tackle Elijah Paige and left guard Emmanuel Pregnon attempted to block the same Wisconsin rusher on one second-quarter play that led directly to Moss getting crunched in a forced-fumble sack. He lay spread-eagle, for a moment, USC stunned with a 21-10 deficit in a first half in which everything that could’ve possibly gone wrong did.

Momentum changed hands in the third quarter, though, as a punt dribbled out of a Wisconsin returner’s hands directly into the waiting arms of USC long snapper Hank Pepper. And Moss went to work, relying heavily on Lane, who absorbed hits over the middle all afternoon and popped up with joy buzzing through every vein of his 6-foot-4 frame.

After two massive first-down tosses, Moss found Lane again on a perfectly-placed floater from the six-yard line to cut Wisconsin’s lead to four. A drive later – and a second straight drive-stopping tackle from stalwart USC safety Kamari Ramsey – Moss hung in against a blitz and lofted a 32-yard beauty to sophomore Duce Robinson, who stretched for every inch his 6-foot-6 frame could muster to pull the toss to earth.

Moss stood tall again a few plays later in the red zone, absorbing an all-outs Badger blitz and whizzing a strike in the tightest of end-zone windows for Robinson to give USC the lead.

And in the fourth quarter, as the game hung in the balance, Moss kept a play-action look and spun away from Wisconsin’s Hunter Wohler. He twisted away, extending just over the goal line as he was crunched to the turf in a sheer display of toughness, the Badgers’ hopes of a comeback left in the dust with Wohler.

Moss was taken briefly to the medical tent after the rushing touchdown but returned to play.