USC vs. Nevada preview: Caleb Williams turns up the pressure

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The first-game excitement has faded. The nerves have settled. Now the real work starts.

After a mostly uninspiring season-opening win against San José State, No. 6 USC will try to level up against Nevada. While freshman Zachariah Branch exceeded already lofty expectations for the five-star prospect, inconsistencies left quarterback Caleb Williams frustrated after the game and pushed him to step up his leadership during practice.

“I’ve been hard on myself,” he said. “I’ve been hard on the team.”

Williams turned up his vocal leadership even higher this week, speaking to other veterans regularly to ensure they continue motivating teammates to keep the energy and focus high. They all know what’s at stake: The Trojans are Pac-12 championship contenders and College Football Playoff hopefuls.

“We know to become the team that we want to be, that we just have to relentlessly just improve and just keep going,” coach Lincoln Riley said. “But that’s our challenge this year, is not get too caught up in all of [the expectations] and just staying the course.”

Here are four things to watch for USC’s game against the Wolf Pack at the Coliseum on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. (Pac-12 Network):

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Too close to call

USC offensive lineman Gino Quinones blocks quarterback Caleb Williams in the Cotton Bowl.

Challengers come from every corner. What USC needs on its offensive line, though, is a champion.

“We’re kind of going to Round 13 of a championship bout and where just one judge scored it 155-153, the next judge 152-155,” offensive line coach Josh Henson said of the ongoing position battles within his group. “I don’t know who won. Everybody thinks a different guy won. I’m just waiting for somebody to quit throwing body blows and throw some knockout punches.”

Riley said he didn’t anticipate repeating last week’s plan of changing the line every series, but frequent changes will remain until players separate themselves. The guard positions — where Gino Quinones, Alani Noa, Emmanuel Pregnon and Michael Tarquin are rotating — are especially tight.

Quinones, who started at right guard last week with the freshman Noa starting on the left side, said he wasn’t sure he would get the first snaps until the game started.

“It’s healthy for us,” said Quinones, a redshirt senior. “It’s a challenge for all of us to step up and when we go in, to make sure there’s no drop in any of the changes.”

Tarquin, a transfer from Florida, was among the players Riley said stood out in the first game. Tarquin was listed as a starter at right guard entering the opener but instead came off the bench behind Quinones.

While Henson appeared to be growing impatient with the lack of clarity within his group, he chose to focus on the silver lining that every player is getting critical game reps that will help solidify depth.

“You can be discouraged by it and be like, somebody needs to step forward with consistency with their play, or you can also look at it from the standpoint of the guys are playing pretty good and they’re battling,” Henson said. “You got more than one guy that’s sitting there playing at a pretty high level. That’s the way I kind of take it, as the second way.”

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Patience, grasshopper

USC running back MarShawn Lloyd carries the ball in front of San José State's Chase Williams and linebacker Bryun Parham.

MarShawn Lloyd never slips. He usually never misses running lanes like the ones he did early against San José State. So at halftime, after mustering no runs longer than four yards on seven carries, the transfer from South Carolina sought help from senior offensive analyst Kliff Kingsbury.

“Too fast,” said Kingsbury, a former Texas Tech and Arizona Cardinals coach.

After being too wired for his long-awaited USC debut, Lloyd said he will practice patience against Nevada. For a running back who prides himself on his breakaway speed, the change of pace is necessary as the Trojans try to establish a consistent running game.

“When you’re a running back, you can’t think of the big play every play,” said Lloyd, who settled in for 42 yards on a team-high nine carries last week. “I was just so antsy wanting the big play but can’t. You gotta take it step by step.”

Lloyd’s longest run was 16 yards, but his most popular play may have come without the ball. The 5-foot-9, 210-pound redshirt junior flattened San José State linebacker Elijah Wood on a block that was shared on Twitter by Fox and Sirius XM analyst Geoff Schwartz. The tweet has more than 200,000 views.

“No blocky, no rocky,” Lloyd said, echoing a favorite saying of former USC running back Travis Dye. “If you don’t know how to block as a running back, especially nowadays and having Caleb next to me, he’s a valuable person on the team. If you can’t block for him, you don’t play.”

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What can Brown do for you?

USC running back Raleek Brown carries the ball against Tulane in the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 2.

Former four-star recruit Raleek Brown was a near no-show in the opener, finishing with one catch for 14 yards in his first game as a full-time receiver. When USC released its depth chart Wednesday, the former running back was missing, having been bumped out of the final slot receiver spot by freshman Makai Lemon.

When asked about Brown this week, Riley jumped to the former Mater Dei star’s defense.

“Everybody wants to judge you like it’s going to be like this the rest of the year after Game 1. It’s one game,” Riley said. “We didn’t get judged last year on how the Rice game went. We all need to remember that for individual teams, for units, for the entire team, there’s a lot of good. Raleek’s done a lot of good. He’s going to be a tremendous player; these are things that you go through.”

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Gimme that

USC defensive back Domani Jackson runs a drill at practice in August 2022.

Takeaways were USC’s defensive calling card last year, but the call dropped last week.

The Trojans failed to force a turnover for just the second time in Alex Grinch’s tenure as defensive coordinator. But they had their chances. Cornerback Domani Jackson dropped a potential interception. Rush end Jamil Muhammad forced a fumble, but the ball squirted out of bounds before the Trojans could recover.

After the Trojans had 29 takeaways last season and led the country in turnover margin, getting back to their ball-hawking remains “the main thing,” Muhammad said.

“We can go three and out, three and out, three and out and we can shut somebody out,” he added, “but if we don’t really get any takeaways or any sack fumbles, or some type of turnover, we don’t really help the offense out that much.”

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Scouting the Wolf Pack

Colorado quarterback Brendon Lewis warms up before a game.

While most teams were solidifying starting lineups and refining play calls during the final two weeks of fall camp, Nevada still was hiring coaches.

The Wolf Pack hired special teams coordinator Peyton Yanagi on Aug. 15 and shuffled the staff again on Aug. 22 when quarterbacks coach Nate Costa abruptly resigned. Yanagi is a first-time full-time assistant at the Football Bowl Subdivision level and Nevada’s second special teams coordinator since March.

After Costa bolted 11 days before the opener against USC, offensive coordinator Derek Sage, who had been working with tight ends, took over the quarterback room and oversaw a position battle won by Colorado transfer Brendon Lewis. The junior started 13 games for the Buffaloes as a freshman in 2021 and earned the season-opening start as a sophomore, but slipped down the depth chart and entered the transfer portal during the season.

USC vs. Nevada preview: Caleb Williams turns up the pressure on his teammates

Too close to call

Patience, grasshopper

What can Brown do for you?

Gimme that

Scouting the Wolf Pack

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