USC football season is here. The Trojans face San Jose State this Saturday to open their 2026 campaign. The start of this particular football season marks the beginning of one of the most consequential college sports cycles in USC history.
Enough is enough
USC athletics has been caught in an endless loop of "almost but not quite" seasons. Women's basketball has been the best revenue-sport program in recent years. When it almost made the Women's Final Four, it was less about the team being inadquate, more about receiving brutally bad luck: the JuJu Watkins injury in the 2025 NCAA Tournament and getting bracketed with UConn in the Elite Eight two straight years. Nevertheless, the Women of Troy didn't make the Final Four. USC is repeating the pattern of getting close
to its goals but not ultimately reaching them.
USC football
USC football almost made the College Football Playoff in 2022 but lost to Utah in the Pac-12 Championship Game. USC almost won a New Year's Six bowl game but imploded late against Tulane in the Cotton Bowl. USC went 9-3 last year when it needed 10-2 to make the CFP. Almost, almost, almost.
USC baseball
USC was two outs away from going to Omaha and returning to the College World Series. It didn't get those two outs. North Carolina went instead and made it all the way to the championship game. Almost.
Droughts abound
Football, baseball, and both basketball programs are sitting on long periods without signature achievements. The football program has never made the playoff. The basketball programs haven't made the Final Four since the women did so in 1986. Baseball hasn't made the College World Series since 2001. The last revenue-sport team at USC to win a major event was the 2016 football team when it beat Penn State in the 2017 Rose Bowl. Since the 2009 Rose Bowl, when USC thumped Penn State, USC's revenue-sport teams have achieved very little. Basketball has delivered two women's Elite Eights and the 2021 men's Elite Eight. Other than that and the 2017 football Pac-12 championship, the cupboard has been bare.
Lincoln Riley
Lincoln Riley has had four years to make the College Football Playoff at USC. This is Year 5. If not now, when? It's time to land the plane and snap this drought. Imagine Ohio State, Alabama, or Georgia going four years without making a playoff appearance.
JuJu Watkins
USC women's basketball hasn't underachieved; it simply lost its superstar in the middle of March Madness in 2025. Now JuJu Watkins is back with an elite recruiting class and two stars, Jazzy Davidson and Kennedy Smith, surrounding her. If not now, when?
Andy Stankiewicz
Andy Stankiewicz has done an impressive job restoring USC baseball. Now it's a question of taking the final step to Omaha and getting the two outs it didn't get last season.
Getting over the hump
USC teams are making a strong effort, but how many more years can fans take it? Not crossing the finish line wears on people's emotions at some point. USC's identity is currently associated with falling short. In this next college sports cycle, falling short won't be easily accepted. It's one of the most important years in USC sports history, and hopefully, it will become memorable for the right reasons.
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This article originally appeared on Trojans Wire: 2026 football season begins one of most crucial years in USC history
