USC starting center Kilian O'Connor out for 2026 football season

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USC hasn't made the College Football Playoff in any of the past 12 seasons mostly because the program and its coaching have not been good enough. However, it's not as though USC has received good luck, either. The Trojans watched Caleb Williams get hurt in the 2022 Pac-12 Championship Game against Utah. Now they have suffered another crushing blow with the news that expected starting center Kilian O'Connor will miss the entire 2026 season due to an injury in practice.

Kilian O'Connor was supposed to be part of an elite USC offensive line this year. That line played extremely well in 2025 under first-year position coach Zach Hanson, who represented a massive upgrade from 2024 offensive line coach Josh Henson. O'Connor developed well under Hanson and was poised to become a rock in the middle of the USC offensive line for quarterback Jayden Maiava and the Trojans' running game. His loss is immense in a year when the Trojans face the best of the best in the Big Ten and will not be able to avoid the projected top teams in the conference.

Hanson now has to reshuffle the offensive line and find an adequate replacement at center. The challenge of facing quality defensive lines from Ohio State, Oregon, and Indiana now gets a lot tougher. If there is one small bread crumb of optimism to be found in this terrible and hugely frustrating story, it is that USC's first four games of the season should not be particularly challenging. The Trojans have four weeks in which to sort things out and learn what they are and aren't capable of on the offensive line. The day when USC has to have real answers on its offensive line: September 26 against the Oregon Ducks.

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This article originally appeared on Trojans Wire: USC starting center Kilian O'Connor out for 2026 football season

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