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Could USC coach Lincoln Riley and quarterback Caleb Williams (13) reunite in the NFL? (Andy Nelson / Associated Press)
You win some, you lose some. At USC, that’s the recipe for a terrible football season.
The 5-5 Trojans, who play UCLA at the Rose Bowl on Saturday night, have blown fourth-quarter leads in all five of their losses. It’s a dramatic departure from the promise of two years ago, when head coach Lincoln Riley went 11-3 in his debut season.
Meanwhile, the 4-6 Chicago Bears have dropped four in a row, averaging 11.5 points in that losing slide. There’s turnover at the top of roughly one-quarter of the 32 NFL teams in a given year, and Chicago’s Matt Eberflus is a leading candidate for replacement. By all indications, he needs to get on a winning streak to save his job, and the Bears have a brutal remaining schedule that includes two games each against Detroit and Minnesota, plus San Francisco, Seattle and Green Bay.
The Bears used last spring’s No. 1 overall draft pick on quarterback Caleb Williams and need to capitalize on that investment. It doesn’t take much to connect the dots between Williams and his old quarterback whisperer at USC.
“Who would you rather put with Caleb Williams than Lincoln Riley?” asked CBS college football analyst Rick Neuheisel, who has coached in both college and the NFL. “If the Bears make a move on Eberflus, why wouldn’t you want to put Caleb with a guy who made him that comfortable?”
It’s all hypothetical now. There’s no indication that Riley has plans — or even a desire — to leave USC. But there’s no avoiding it, his name will surface as vacancies pop open.
Read more: ‘The smarter one usually comes over here’: UCLA’s DeShaun Foster throws jabs at USC
In order to gauge the NFL interest in Riley, and how it has been affected by his three seasons at USC, I reached out to two top-level team executives, one from each conference. I provided them anonymity, including their team and specific job title, so…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/front-offices-see-uscs-lincoln-193854936.html
Author : LA Times
Publish date : 2024-11-21 19:38:00
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