It was a one-score game with a touchdown pass from Jayden Maiava to Ja’Kobi Lane with 8:43 left, followed by a quick defensive stop and USC had the momentum and opportunity to pull away from the two-touchdown -Deficit against No. 5 Notre Dame.

But on first-and-10 at the Fighting Irish 21, Maiava was intercepted by Christian Gray, who returned the ball 99 yards for a hard-hitting touchdown.

Another pick-6 from Notre Dame’s Xavier Watts on the next series sealed the decision as the Trojans ultimately lost 49-35 after a late touchdown of their own.

USC ends the regular season at 6-6, while Notre Dame enters the College Football Playoff with a record of 11-1.

Trojans coach Lincoln Riley then spoke about the current difficulty for him and his team.

“Just a painful defeat. In the end, it was really hard just standing here with all the guys coming through and watching great Trojans like this guy here (Jaylin Smith) come up that tunnel for the last time,” Riley said. “There were so many people here that I think paved the way. They’ve invested in this program, they’ve been part of our journey to continue to build this thing, and I’m proud to have coached them, proud of those guys on this journey.”

Riley wasn’t ready to talk about the big picture and where his Trojans program is going: from 11-3 in his first season to 8-5 last year to 6-6 with a bowl game on the horizon .

“Yes, this game ended 20 minutes ago. So we have time to come here. I know there is time for that and I can answer all of these questions, that’s part of the job as a head coach and I’m not afraid of that. But this is about this team and this moment, these guys, the ones here in the Colosseum played the last game,” he said. “I could sit here for an hour and talk about the things that I know are happening in this program. I could rattle off all the stats, I could show you facilities, I could show you recruiting, I could show you personnel, I could talk about this for another hour – I just don’t think now is the right time.

Watch the full postgame press conference below and scroll down for a full transcript of Riley’s comments.

Full transcript of Lincoln Riley’s postgame comments…

Opening comments:

“Just an agonizing defeat. In the end, it was really hard to just stand here while all the guys came through and watch great Trojans like this guy here (Jaylin Smith) come up that tunnel for the last time. There were so many guys here. “I think that paved the way. They’ve invested in this program, they’ve been part of our journey to continue to build this thing, and I’m proud to have accompanied them on this journey, kind of a mix of people like Jaylin who have been here a long time and some people who have decided to end their careers here with us, but the appreciation for them is far-reaching, as I told them over time in the locker room uphill and downhill, they always have to look back on it and know that they were a part of it – and They were, that’s true.

“So, thankful, man. I was grateful to coach this team this regular season. It was really fun to train the team. We fought today like we have all year. We just haven’t played well enough during the season.” In the second half we created a few chances at the end and tried to stay aggressive. But it was a good football game. Proud of “We will regroup here, of course get our bowl assignment, participate in the development with our young people and prepare for the last game of the season here.”

What gives you confidence that the program is moving in the right direction?

“Yes, this game ended 20 minutes ago. So we have time to come here. I know there’s time for that and I can answer all of these questions, that’s part of the job as a head coach and I’m not afraid of that.” But this is about this team and this moment, these guys playing their last game here in the Coliseum have played. I could sit here for an hour and talk about the things that I know are happening in this program statistics, I could show you facilities, I could show you recruiting, I could show you staff, I could a Talk about it for an hour – I just don’t think now is the right time.”

Was it a miscommunication on the first interception – it looked like Jayden Maiava was throwing on the back shoulder and Kyron Hudson was looking toward the corner?

“I have to watch this on video. Obviously everything turned around so quickly because we got the ball back straight away and had to go back down to score again. We initiated a play and tried to be aggressive all night long. Jayden gave our guys chances to make a lot of one-on-one plays. Yeah, it looked like we weren’t quite on the same page and the corner got his look back and made a nice play on the ball.”

How much of an impact did Woody Mark’s early exit have on the running game?

“I thought Quinten and Bryan came in and did some really good things, so I don’t feel like we were like, ‘Oh no, Woody’s not there, all of a sudden we can’t do these things.’ But listen, Woody was our best offensive player this year. So when I sit here and say it didn’t have an impact, it had an impact, but I thought our backs were in a good place and still had some really big plays. I never really want to lose a guy like that.

What did you think of the defensive performance?

“Yeah, I thought we hung in there and made some big plays in the first half. Obviously we had two turnovers, which were huge at that point. But we just didn’t work well enough against the run – period.” That was the story of the day for me, so to speak. We didn’t defend the run as well as we had and I thought that made them pretty complex. And then we had a few opportunities to make some competitive plays defensively and offensively there were in the second half, and they We made significantly more of them than we did defensively, in every way, but it certainly wasn’t our best today. “

Do you talk to them about life as much after a game like this as you do about football afterwards?

“Yes, you do. You have a great responsibility here. These are transformative years for these boys. These guys are going through a lot on a very public stage. They’re putting their hearts and souls on the line and my message to them.” There’s no denying that this team has put their hearts and souls on the line. And when we go through what we have emotionally, you can’t question this football There are times when we could have played Yes, we could have trained better. Yes, we put that on the line every week and my message to the boys was, “You keep doing that.” “In your life, you keep doing that in this football program, the things you want will come.” And that they had to walk out of that locker room with their heads held high. If you give up, if you give in, if you break down, then you should walk out of that locker room with your head down. This team has no reason to put their heads down. I am very, very proud to coach her.

Why do you feel like this team never got through despite everything that went through this year?

“Well, I think No. 1, I think there’s really strong leadership in this program. I think this group has really taken care of each other in building this thing and bringing it back, no matter what side – the coaching staff. I mean, you train long enough. Sometimes I’ll be part of teams that don’t win some games, or you’ll have difficult moments, and most of the time I’ve been through that, at some point there will be blame, disagreements. There’s something that I’ve had to do as a head coach, or I’ve watched other head coaches do when I wasn’t a head coach, like they have to step in or stop doing it. That never happened with this football team. Not once.

“So I knew we were going to show up every week and we were going to keep going and I knew we were going to have a chance to make it here at the end. “Obviously we really wanted to do all three.” I think it speaks to what we’re building, the quality of the individuals in this room, and I think this team has done that as a program and we’ll continue to grow from it myself “I’m going to get better, but it’s a damn good start.”

What did you learn about Jayden Maiava over the course of these games?

“He did a good job. You know, it’s not an easy situation, especially when you’re playing three good programs and three pretty good defenses. Not a single trick was included in this schedule. Especially the way he played today, that’s the best we’ve played offensively all year. That’s a really good defense and we’ve had some pretty good performances against them. “I was impressed with how he played the whole time, taking care of our position. That’s what this position has to do, and I thought he answered the call.”

Do you think this Notre Dame team can make the playoffs?

“Yes, it is a good football team. I think the teams we played here the first two years are probably the most complete Notre Dame teams we’ve ever played, they’re probably the best offensive teams they’ve ever had.” In my opinion “They’ve done a good job over the last few years, but I’ll give them credit.”