USC Football: Lincoln Riley On Cusp Of Making NCAA History This Week
The Trojans head coach has achieved a landmark.
If Caleb Williams is picked No. 1 overall this week in the 2024 NFL Draft as expected, USC head coach Lincoln Riley would make history.
Riley would become the first college football head coach to produce three No. 1 overall picks in the common draft era after his former quarterbacks Baker Mayfield (2018) and Kyler Murray (2019) were also drafted first overall.
The common draft era began in 1967, after the AFL and NFL began holding one combined draft rather than two competing ones. Since then, there have been 27 quarterbacks drafted No. 1 overall, which would make Williams the 28th if he does get picked first.
This would simply add to the legacy Riley has established as a quarterback whisperer. Not only would Riley have led all three of these quarterbacks to winning the Heisman Trophy, but to the becoming the top prospect in their draft. Riley worked with both Mayfield and Murray at Oklahoma, and ultimately Williams would join him there. When Riley went to USC in 2022, Williams followed suit to stay under Riley's tutelage.
What's even remarkable is Riley has not been a head coach for that long. After serving as a position coach at Texas Tech and East Carolina for over a decade, he worked his way up to becoming an offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach with Oklahoma before he was promoted to head coach in 2017. In just seven years as a head coach, Riley has produced what will most likely be three first overall picks, when no other coach has done so in even much longer tenures. If he chooses to continue coaching long enough and brings in more strong quarterback recruits, he could possibly lead a fourth to a Heisman Trophy or becoming the first pick in the draft.
