Fired too late, Alex Grinch’s last stand ends USC’s season

USC defensive coordinator Alex Grinch yells at the defense after it gave up a Washington touchdown at the Coliseum.

Columnist

Nov. 5, 2023 Updated 3:23 PM PT

What a waste.

The USC football season essentially ended Saturday as one big fat waste.

A wasted brilliant offense. A wasted Heisman Trophy winner. A wasted full Coliseum. A wasted revival of Trojan pride.

Wasted, all of it, because of coach Lincoln Riley’s refusal to fix an indefensibly bad defense that, in a single, frightening word, has forever chiseled itself on to this season’s tombstone.

GRINCHED

The end came Saturday night in front of a rollicking sellout crowd that roared as the Caleb Williams-led Trojans offense pinned 42 points and 515 yards on fifth-ranked and unbeaten Washington.

And still lost.

They lost because the Alex Grinch-led defense gave up Washington 52 points … and 572 total yards … and an unthinkable 316 rushing yards to the 117th-ranked rushing team in the country.

They lost 52-42, the Huskies steamrollering defensive coordinator Grinch’s national embarrassment while sending the Trojans to their third defeat and essentially knocking them out of the Pac-12 championship hunt with two games remaining.

Grinch was finally fired Sunday morning, but it’s too late. Riley finally put the success of the Trojans’ program ahead of the protection of his buddy, but it’s way, way too late.

An autumn that began with national championship dreams has now been whittled to the Rob Gronkowski Bowl or bust, and the aftermath of this final dagger Saturday night was absolutely heartbreaking.

There was Williams, leaning into the stands, hugging his mother, openly weeping.

“I want to go home and cuddle with my dog and watch some shows,” he said.

This is what happens when you lead one of the country’s top five offenses for two seasons and yet your defense continually ensures that you can’t win any sort of championship.

USC quarterback Caleb Williams walks off the field during the Trojans' loss to Washington at the Coliseum.

There was linebacker Mason Cobb, sitting with six other forlorn teammates at the postgame news conference, burying his head in his hoodie.

“Kind of looked like guys weren’t ready to make the play,” he said.

Weren’t ready to make the play? Yep, that sounds like the nation’s 120th-ranked rushing defense.

There was safety Calen Bullock, talking softly and looking confused.

“ All [the] big runs, either someone is not in their gap, or someone isn’t lined up,” he said.

Someone isn’t lined up? Indeed, that sounds like the nation’s 107th-ranked passing defense.

Finally, at the very end of the night, there was a quickly emptying Coliseum field dotted with giddy Huskies dancing around grim security guards, yet another team that showed up and ran the Trojans ragged.

USC had the nationally 111th-ranked defense before this game, and proceeded to play as if they should be dead last.

“Just pissed,” said Riley afterward. “Pissed that we missed this opportunity.”

Riley should be mostly pissed at himself, because Riley did this. He did this when he didn’t fire Grinch after last season’s late collapses against Utah and Tulane. He did this when he didn’t fire Grinch earlier this season as the Trojans were giving up 40-plus points four times in a stretch of five games.

Riley did this by shielding his close pal from Oklahoma even as Grinch’s struggles cracked the foundation of a program Riley was hired to build. Riley did this while displaying a loyalty that feels worse than nepotism, he did this while being paid $10 million a year to know better.

USC quarterback Caleb Williams and coach Lincoln Riley make their way to the field at the Coliseum.

Grinch has finally been ousted in an announcement issued by the school early Sunday afternoon but it’s too late, it should have happened long ago. In a leadership fail that will forever symbolize his first two seasons here, Riley did this.

Everyone knew the firing would happen, so the real question is whether Riley will admit it should have long since happened. He wasn’t talking Sunday, but on Saturday night before the firing, I asked him, did he have any regrets about how he has handled the defense?

“I understand the question, I know it’s y’all’s question to ask it, but I’m not into the big-picture questions right now,” Riley said, later adding, “I know as a head coach, it all falls under my responsibility ultimately and I don’t shy away from that and I never have, but there are times and places for those discussions and those will happen at the appropriate times.”

Sadly for the sake of a talented team that deserves better, the appropriate time was long ago. Grinch should have been long gone before Sunday, and Riley isn’t the only one who has been shrinking from his duty.

Where in the world was new athletic director Jennifer Cohen? She could have pushed Riley earlier to make the tough call on his pal. There is recent precedent for that sort of shove.

This week Iowa athletic director Beth Goetz announced that offensive coordinator Brian Ferentz, son of coach Kirk Ferentz, would no longer be with the team after the end of the season.

Goetz had to fire the son because apparently his father could not. It was the end of a nightmare that feels like the USC situation.

Grinch is not related to Riley, but it sure seemed that way. Remember, he was one of the handful of assistants who traveled on the private plane with Riley when the head coach arrived here for his celebratory opening news conference two years ago. It eventually seemed like the only way to get rid of him before Sunday would have been intervention from above, but that didn’t happen, and so Grinch was given one last chance to save Saturday’s game, midway through the fourth quarter, Washington with the ball on its own nine-yard line and leading by three.

If USC holds, they have the offensive firepower to drive down and win the game. But USC couldn’t hold. USC never holds.

On the first play of the drive, Washington running back Dillon Johnson took a pitch and raced 53 yards virtually untouched down the sideline to set up the Huskies’ clinching touchdown on Johnson’s one-yard run.

Fifty-three yards. On the first play of the game’s biggest drive. Unconscionable.

Johnson, a running back who had never gained more than 100 yards in a game, ran for 263 yards and four touchdowns. Unthinkable.

Johnson gained 199 yards before contact. That’s right, nearly 200 yards before he was touched. Unimaginable.

“They were slowing down,” Johnson said afterward. “They weren’t pressing as much as we thought they would. It made our day kind of easy.”

Slowing down? Not pressing as much? Made their day kind of easy? That quote right there could have led to Grinch being fired on the spot.

“Yeah, I mean, obviously, wasn’t good enough,” Riley said of the run defense. “I mean, not by any stretch of the imagination. Couple of big plays in the run game, certainly at inopportune times.”

In the case of the Washington loss, inopportune is defined as giving up big chunks of yards as the amazing scrambling Williams is throwing for 312 yards and three touchdowns, the tough Austin Jones is rushing for 127 yards, and the spectacular Tahj Washington is catching passes for 122 yards.

Earlier last week, Grinch took responsibility for the defense’s failings.

“Couldn’t be more disappointed in myself,” Grinch told reporters, later adding, “We gotta get it fixed, and we gotta get it fixed fast.”

USC finally made that fix Sunday, but it wasn’t fast enough.

Alex Grinch has lost his job but only after USC lost its season.

What a waste.