Northwestern head coach David Braun speaks following his team's 38-17 loss to USC

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On Friday, the USC football team defeated Northwestern at the Coliseum 38-17. With the victory, the Trojans improved to 7-2 on the season and 5-1 in Big Ten play. Northwestern, on the other hand, fell to 5-4 and 3-3 in conference play with the loss. Following the game, Wildcats head coach David Braun discussed his team’s performance. Here are some of the highlights of what he had to say:

On his team’s execution

“Dissapointed in the game and the second half,” Braun said. “We didn’t do the things that were going to be required to win this football game in terms of establishing the line of scrimmage, controlling the football when we had it offensively, and extending drives. That’s our brand of football. Defensively, we weren’t playing well early on, but found a way to kind of settle in.”

On USC’s success throwing the ball

“We knew Nebraska was an outlier in their passing game,” Braun said. “Nebraska had done a great job against USC, but you knew USC was going to find a way to respond. They’re talented, talented wide receivers supported by a quarter- back that plays at a really high level. Coach Riley is a great coach, and ultimately, I think we ended up playing on our heels a little. He did a good job finding all of the wide receivers. They dialed up a couple creative plays, whether it be double passes or scans and more stuff, but that’s just some things. You have to do a better job of winning one on one matchups and in time, finding opportunities to be more aggressive in your place.”

On the fallout from USC quarterback Jayden Maiava’s forced fumble

“We can’t let it affect us, though ultimately, we can feel the emotion,” Braun said. “We just got to take a breath and play the next play just like it never happened. Ultimately, first and 10, minus 20, minus 25, still play them all and fit up some run game. We can’t let those emotional scenes happen. Those are going to happen in the Big 10. Simply, a long four quarters, there’s going to be back and forth with good football teams.”

On USC’s fake punt

“I don’t think Coach Riley has faked a punt since 2017 and ultimately, it 100% falls on me,” Braun said. “It’s a lesson learned. One of their backup quarterbacks, number seven was wearing number 80, the same number as their punter, which did not show up on the roster online and hadn’t shown anywhere else. But they did legally submit that. It was on the game day roster that was here at the Coliseum. And the lesson I’ve learned in that for the rest of my career is when we arrive at a facility, we will go over that fine tooth comb, look for any of those potential issues. If we knew that they’re backup quarterback was in the game in that situation either would have been safe, or would have called the timeout. Credit to Coach Riley and his staff, creative design, well executed, huge momentum at that point in the game.”

On his team’s poor clock management in the third quarter

“Yeah, we should have called a timeout,” Braun said. “Ultimately, we know our fourth down ghost scenario was there. We were okay, taking a penalty there and taking a delay of game, creating some space for our group with a pin punt. And, you know, ultimately, we hustled to the line of scrimmage. We tried to draw them offsides with an aggressive D-line in a fourth down situation like that. We don’t get them to jump off sides. We just say we’re gonna let this run down. We’re gonna take the penalty, give ourselves a little more space on the pin punt. Ultimately, Preston (Stone QB) ended up calling the timeout. Should not have been a timeout. We should have taken the five yards.”

This article originally appeared on Trojans Wire: Northwestern’s David Braun discusses his team’s loss to USC football

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