Fans had been expecting something interesting this season from Lincoln Riley and the USC Trojans. For the first time, star boy Caleb Williams would not be seen donning the red and yellow threads. However, little did the CFB world expect the HC to change the captaincy roles as per the games. That’s some brave attempt on Riley’s part to alter his captaincy roster game to game. This left the analysts to share their take on how the HC is coping with the changes and yet entering the 2024 kickoff with full confidence. 

Right before the big season began, Trojans HC faced the media on August 27, after the practice. The national perception of the program has already suffered a blow now that Williams is not present in the building to rage the offense as QB1. In Williams’ absence, now Miller Moss is running the show. While the CFB world was engrossed to find out about the new QB’s talents, here Riley came up with a twist. He will not be going with season-long captains. 

Riley applied his strategy to name the coaches on a game-by-game basis. “We’re going to have captains this year game by game…our captains are going to be earned each week.”  While he is yet to curate the names for the upcoming weeks, the Trojans HC is sorted about the season opener that is scheduled for this weekend. 

The checked-and-approved nominees for the first week are- wide receiver Kyron Hudson, quarterback Miller Moss, center Jonah Monheim, safety Akili Arnold and linebacker Easton Mascarenas-Arnold. And on what basis the captaincy baton would move from hand to hand? Riley enlightened, “That’ll change, not necessarily on somebody not doing a good job. It’s just going to be the five that we think are the most deserving and the ones that we want leading us out each and every week. Kind of like this game of college football, every week you’ve got to earn it.” This was enough to woo the big shots from the sports media. 

Lincoln Riley’s new plan gets huge thumbs-up from analysts

The CFB world could not wait for Riley’s army in Williams’ absence to move the LSU Tigers to dust as a fan enthusiastically commented, “No lie I wana see that usc vs lsu opening game.” USC writer, Chris Treviño could wait no longer to amplify the HC’s new strategy as he tweeted, “#USC’s Team Captains for Week 1: OL Jonah Monheim QB Miller Moss  DB Akili Arnold  LB Easton Mascarenas-Arnold WR Kyron Hudson Captain status will be earned week to week. No permanent captains.”

Sports broadcaster Jack Smith pointed out how Riley has been brewing this plan for quite some time now, “QB Miller Moss says Lincoln Riley approached him with this idea earlier in the offseason. Moss thinks it forces early season captains to keep up with their leadership. He said you don’t want people representing your team at the end of the season that no longer deserve it.”

The USC Trojans HC’s initiative to kick stagnancy out of the squad impressed USC Athletics’ director of creative content Keely Eure who highlighted, “USC will name its captains on a game-by-game basis, head coach Lincoln Riley said.  Riley said they wanted to make a shift and make it something that needs to be earned each week.”

Publisher of TrojansSports.com, Ryan Young too dropped in to propagate Trojans’ new scheme, “Lincoln Riley said that #USC is not naming season-long team captains this year but rather picking game captains each week.” Lincoln Riley’s boys are ready to step up and make a grand entrance!