USC’s preseason-style opening stretch is officially complete.

Over the first three weeks, the Trojans handled their business the way a team with College Football Playoff ambitions should against lesser competition: They won comfortably, built momentum, developed younger players and, most importantly, avoided any costly setbacks.

Saturday night’s 49-30 win over Louisiana at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum marked the final step in that opening assignment.

Now, the warmup period can be discarded. The real season is about to begin.

USC enters the next phase at 3-0, having defeated San Jose State, Fresno State and Louisiana. Those matchups gave coach Lincoln Riley valuable time to experiment with lineups, settle on rotations and allow emerging contributors to gain experience without the consequences that can come in a tighter game.

“It’s been good for us to play a bunch of players in all three nonconference games,” Riley said. “I think if we’d set a goal, it would’ve been, win the first three games, get a chance to play a bunch of guys, develop your roster, and evaluate, which we’ve been able to do.”

Beginning next week, however, USC will no longer have that margin for experimentation.

The Trojans head east to play Rutgers next Saturday, opening a Big Ten slate that should reveal far more about USC than its three nonconference victories did.

And the road ahead is nothing short of brutal.

Five of USC’s next seven opponents are currently ranked in the top 20: No. 6 Oregon, No. 19 Washington, No. 16 Penn State, No. 1 Ohio State and reigning national champion No. 5 Indiana.

It’s time to take the training wheels off and see if USC is a legitimate national contender or gets swallowed up by the heavyweights it was built to beat. 

And nobody has more to gain over the next two months than Jayden Maiava.

The USC quarterback threw for 261 yards and five touchdowns Saturday, although his otherwise productive night included an interception on the Trojans’ opening drive. Maiava has looked comfortable and increasingly commanding through three games, but September statistics accumulated against inferior competition don’t build a Heisman Trophy campaign.

What comes next can.

If Maiava wants to force his way into the Heisman conversation, Oregon, Washington, Penn State, Ohio State and Indiana provide the stage. Those are the games that turn impressive numbers into nationally televised moments and good quarterbacks into household names.

“I think we’ve just got to continue to stack the days, stay the course, be present in the moment, trust our coaches and trust our preparation,” said Maiava when asked if he can continue his level of play against tougher Big 10 competition. “One day at a time.”

We’ll soon discover whether Maiava is simply thriving inside Riley’s quarterback-friendly offense or becoming the next great USC quarterback.

The encouraging part is that he’s got weapons around him.

King Miller rushed for 128 yards and a touchdown on Saturday, while USC’s freshmen once again offered a tantalizing glimpse of what Riley is building around his quarterback.

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Tight end Mark Bowman caught two touchdown passes. Trent Mosley was even more electric, turning a punt return into an 86-yard touchdown before climbing the ladder for a spectacular 21-yard touchdown reception in the third quarter.

“If there’s another team having more young guys contribute in the country right now, I’d love to see it,” said Riley about his freshman standouts. “My excitement is, I feel like our peak, our trajectory, should be even higher because of how many young guys are playing and learning and playing their first games.”

Mosley doesn’t merely look like a promising freshman anymore. He looks dangerous every time the football finds him.

Those are the weapons USC will need when the margins shrink.

And they are about to shrink dramatically.

That brings us to the other side of the football, where USC should leave Saturday with considerably more questions.

Gary Patterson’s arrival brought hope that the Trojans had finally fixed the chronic defensive problems that have haunted the Riley era. The early returns were impressive. Fresno State managed only 116 total yards in USC’s 39-0 victory, the fewest USC had allowed since 2008 and the program’s first shutout since 2024.

Through two games, USC had outgained its opponents 1,057-452.

Then Louisiana provided evidence that Patterson’s defense might not be as dominant as we thought. 

The Ragin’ Cajuns scored 30 points and trailed only 14-10 late in the first half. That’s notable because USC had surrendered just three points before the fourth quarter across its first two games.

Louisiana’s quarterback Lunch Winfield threw for 212 yards and a touchdown. He also rushed for 91 yards and two touchdowns. Louisiana entered the weekend hovering around No. 95 nationally in broad computer rankings. If that offense could make USC uncomfortable, imagine what Oregon will do.

“Give Louisiana a lot of credit. Their quarterback’s a hell of a player,” said Riley of Louisiana’s offense. “He makes a lot of plays and covers up a lot. I thought those guys competed hard and are a good football team.”

That’s not a verdict on Patterson’s defense after three games. He also was able to use these first three games to establish a rotation and clean up mistakes. 

“We’ve got to clean up some stuff,” admitted defensive end Luke Waffle. “It’s good to get this victory under the belt and just keep on stacking days, getting better every week.”

USC has spent September showing us its potential without having to prove much of it.

That all changes now.

Rutgers comes first. Oregon arrives at the Coliseum one week later. Then the schedule becomes a weekly examination of whether Riley finally has a team capable of surviving the Big Ten rather than merely dazzling against the soft part of its schedule.

USC is undefeated. Maiava is rolling. The freshmen are electric. Patterson’s defense has flashed real improvement.

All of it looks promising, but now the dress rehearsal is over and it’s time to find out if USC is for real.

BAGHDAD — Iraq moved swiftly Saturday to limit the diplomatic and security fallout after Iran-backed militias were accused of striking a crucial Saudi oil pipeline, forcing the world’s largest oil producer to halt an export route designed to bypass the Iranian-threatened Strait of Hormuz.

An umbrella organization representing Iran-aligned Iraqi militias denied any role. But Baghdad confirmed that the attacks originated inside Iraq, vowed to launch an investigation and removed two senior officials from their posts.

The strike on Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline coincided with renewed pressure from Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, at the southern entrance to the Red Sea. Roughly 12% of global trade passes through the strategic waterway, which the Houthis have targeted as part of their campaign against neighboring Saudi Arabia and its shipping interests.

Regional officials told The Associated Press that the Houthi movement and Iraqi militias had recently coordinated attacks targeting Saudi Arabia.

The escalation raises the prospect of another surge in global oil prices after six months of war. U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran was “probably” behind the pipeline attack, while also seeking to ease fears of a wider confrontation.

“The Houthis called us, and they don’t want to fight with us,” Trump said. “They would much prefer not having us involved, and they’re letting most ships go through.” He added that his administration had held “discussions” with the Houthis, though neither Trump nor the White House specified when those contacts took place. The administration held at least one round of talks with the group in May 2025.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian rejected the suggestion that Tehran was engaged in a conflict with Riyadh. “We are not in war with Saudi Arabia, and the Houthis have their own problems,” he told India Today TV while attending the BRICS summit in India.

Iraq to investigate attack on Saudi pipeline

The Iraqi militia coalition again denied responsibility for the Saudi pipeline strikes, even as it praised the Houthis for what it described as their “ongoing battlefield victories against Saudi forces.”

The group said it would cooperate with Baghdad’s investigation.

Iraq is facing intensifying pressure to stop armed groups on its soil from supporting Iranian proxy forces. Baghdad has ordered nonstate armed factions to disarm by Sept. 30, but several of the country’s most influential militias — including Iran-backed groups — have said they will not comply.

Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi said he had ordered an investigation into the operations command of Maysan province, along the border with Iran, and dismissed the province’s commander. His office later said the provincial police chief was also dismissed.

Saudi Arabia shut down the cross-country oil pipeline on Friday, saying it was a “precautionary measure” after the pipeline came under drone attack the day before. It blamed the attacks on several drones that came from Iraq but said the kingdom would not retaliate, to give the Iraqi government “an opportunity to take the necessary measures.”

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Several Arab countries including Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Egypt, condemned the attack, according to the Saudi state news agency.

Built in the 1980s, the East-West pipeline has played an important role in Saudi Arabia’s ability to export oil following this year’s disruption of the Strait of Hormuz. By early June, Saudi Arabia had more than doubled oil exports from the Red Sea port at the pipeline’s end to more than 5 million barrels per day, according to the International Energy Agency.

Iran-backed Iraqi militias have carried out strikes on U.S.-linked targets both inside and outside Iraq since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28.

Saudi Arabia and the United States bombed Iranian-backed militias in Iraq in July after blaming them for drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities that had been claimed by the Houthis. Regional officials told the AP that the Houthis helped the militias plan and execute the attacks.

Valiollah Hayati, deputy governor of Iran’s southwestern Khuzestan province, said Shalamcheh and Chazabeh crossings were closed.

Diplomacy continues in a tense region

Iran has said a regional meeting is planned Monday between Iran and other Gulf countries about talks between Tehran and Oman – located on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz – on managing shipping there.

Commercial ship traffic remains low on what had been considered an international waterway before the war. Iran has expressed interest in having ships pay fees for transit. It has said traffic into the Persian Gulf from the Gulf of Oman would pass entirely through Iranian waters, while the outbound route would pass partly through Iranian waters and partly through Oman’s territorial waters.

“The waterway would be opened up on the condition that the U.S. will terminate its blockade,” Iran’s president said in his interview with the Indian broadcaster.

Bahrain on Saturday, however, said it will not attend any group meeting including Iran before the restoration of diplomatic relations between the countries.

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Jill Lawless and Darlene Superville in Dublin contributed to this report.