USC defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn takes Penn State defensive coordinator job
USC DC D’Anton Lynn on the sideline against NEB on Nov. 16, 2024. (Gina Ferazzi / LAT)
Ryan Kartje (LA Times) — Last January, D’Anton Lynn was given the chance to trade in his defensive coordinator job with the Trojans to lead the defense at his alma mater, Penn State. But Lynn turned Penn State down, and USC, in turn, gave its rising star coach a significant raise.
Now, with the same offer on the table less than a year later, Lynn has decided to change course.
Lynn is leaving USC after two seasons to become the defensive coordinator at Penn State under new coach Matt Campbell, a person familiar with the decision but not authorized to speak on the matter told The Times.
What changed in the 11 months between those two offers, outside of new leadership at Penn State, remains unclear. The Nittany Lions entered last season as presumed national title contenders before bottoming out in the first half of the season under James Franklin, who was fired in October. Campbell was hired earlier this month, but has no known ties to Lynn.
At USC, Lynn engineered an impressive turnaround of a Trojan defense that completely unraveled under previous coordinator Alex Grinch. USC gave up 10 fewer points per game under Lynn last season, leaping from 121st in the nation (34.4 points per game) to a respectable 56th (24.1). The defense improved considerably against the run, giving up nearly 50 fewer yards per game, and with its tackling, missing three fewer on average per game.
But the progress was less apparent in his second season as coordinator. USC allowed fewer points per game during the 2025 regular season, but struggled especially to stop the run and prevent big plays. Those issues proved particularly glaring in USC’s road losses to Illinois, Notre Dame and Oregon.
Still, when UCLA’s head coaching job came open in September, Lynn, who previously led the Bruins defense, was seen as a potential candidate for the job. After turning down the Nittany Lions in January, many viewed Lynn’s next logical step being the NFL, where he spent his entire coaching tenure prior to joining UCLA.
His departure leaves USC to look for its third defensive coordinator in four years.
It is notable that Penn State was able to pry Lynn, a former Nittany Lion player, away from a fellow hopeful Big Ten contender in USC. After going a combined 15-11 in 2023 and 2024, USC enters Tuesday’s Alamo Bowl matchup with TCU with a 9-3 record. Next year figures to be a pivotal one for Riley’s tenure with the Trojans.
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What does D’Anton Lynn’s departure mean for USC? Antonio Morales/Bruce Feldman (The Athletic) — The Trojans didn’t field a top-25 defense, which their fans hoped for this season, but that wasn’t realistic because USC had too many personnel deficiencies. Multiple things can be true: Lynn didn’t have a great season in 2025 — USC got mashed in its three biggest games (Illinois, Notre Dame and Oregon) — but the defense definitely improved during his time with the program. But it leaves Lincoln Riley in an interesting spot. Lynn is the best DC he’s had in his time as a… Read more »
We hope LR would have learned the value of an average to good defense like we had in 2024. The top 10+ head coaches of course already know the value of a good defense as it’s mandatory for a natty. It’s all in the statistics, which we hope LR has looked at for “learning on the job” purposes. Administratively we have some top firepower in Jen and Bowden thus let them make this critical hire heading into a meat grinder schedule in 2026.
Let’s give Lincoln Riley some credit. He finally came out publicly and took a hard core stand against Notre Dame’s refusing to accept a totally reasonable USC scheduling plan to go forward. Notre Dame decided it would rather play BYU than USC.
Eventually, I think USC and ND will be playing again. Maybe ND won’t have a special side deal to get into the POs then. I won’t be holding my breath until it happens, but I would imagine it’ll be quite a donnybrook whenever it occurs.
The notion that LR was running away from competition I think is over blown. It never made sense to me to keep playing ND in October and especially at the end of November. I think ND’s schedule will continue to deteriorate. Looking at their ’26 schedule, 3 of the worst teams in the Big10, 3 of the worst teams in the ACC, Rice, Navy. Their only challenges are Miami (at home), BYU and SMU (at home).
Allen as long as ND can get away with having a purposely pathetically weak schedule (see 2026 and beyond) and the CFB playoff committee looks the way as far as SOS, ND will be in no hurry to negotiate a schedule with us. ND will have a double digit spread for every game except Miami, which ND has at home. Just the 2026 schedule alone, even if they sweep, should put them on the bubble at best, except for their little side deal they made with CFB.
Watch ND seek out a true blue-blood like USC, and then agree to play that blue blood in September, just like USC wanted. Do you think that would make ND look petty? Or do you think ND should do exactly that to prop up their cupcake schedule? College football has become such a changed sport over the last few years. It’s hard for me to fathom where CFB is really headed. But with every day, USC v ND may become less important to me for all I know. Things change with time. I am happy that USC stood its ground… Read more »
With D’Anton Lynn moving on to PSU, I can’t help but feel he didn’t really improve certain aspect of team defense when it came to pressuring & sacking the opponent QB and running defense. Both were underachieving in his two years here. Was it due to the lack of the player ability, the lack of coaching or what? Why would Lynn walk away at a time when the #1 recruiting class is coming in with promising defensive players and thus show he can mold a top defensive team? Or was there a roadblock he felt he couldn’t overcome here?
It could simply be he saw more in Matt Campbell than he did last year in James Franklin. I think we all do. And now was his chance to go back to his alma mater Penn St. In a few years he will move on to DC in the NFL. Wish him well, just not against USC.
Chip Kelly is named OC at Northwestern. Can he repair his reputation? — Chip Kelly joins Northwestern as offensive coordinator after the Raiders fired him mid-season with a 2-9 record and mixed NFL head coaching results. — The hire comes after Kelly’s orchestration of Ohio State’s national championship offense, which he abandoned last year to pursue an NFL opportunity with Las Vegas. — Northwestern finished 15th in Big Ten scoring this season, giving Kelly a chance to rebuild his reputation at the program’s new $850-million stadium. Steve Henson (LA Times) — Chip Kelly didn’t land on his feet by… Read more »
I still think CK is a really great OC and that HC at NWU is a really good coach. CK was just not made for pro football. He’s 19-19 at NWU with 2 winning seasons out of 3 seasons that he has been there. That’s good at NWU. I’m glad SC doesn’t play them next year.
SC should win even though they are missing a lot of really good players. TCU is only losing 2 players….the QB and the Receiver. But those 2 players are 7th and 5th in the nation in their respective categories. Just those players are a large part of their offense(68%). Their running game is weak(under 1600 yards with a 3.9 average). Defensively, they are only rated 69th in the nation
Pete Kwiatkowski was a scapegoat for Texas’s failed season. In 2024 and 2025 they finished 4th and 29th in total defense. Considering that there is 130 some teams in the NCAA, that’s not bad. I never thought Sark was a great HC. A pretty good OC but not a HC. They couldn’t wait to get rid of him at Washington.
And so weirdly, USC was happy to oblige. Thanks Pat Haden. Ugh.
With Jen Cohen, a lot more is possible.
I don’t really keep track of the ‘Horns, but I wonder how much strong support Sark has in Austin now? He always seems to have a ceiling that’s slightly lower than hoped for.
TEXAS plays MICH in the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl on Dec. 31 in Orlando, Fla (12 noon PT). Whittingham, hired on Dec. 26, is already in Orlando, but interim HC Biff Poggi will be coaching the game for the Wolverines.
As if we all didn’t know, getting this new DC hire right is massively important to USC’s immediate football future in 2026, and beyond. I can’t wait to see who Bowden, Cohen and Riley settle on. This is such a big deal. We’ve all read the names of the possible Lynn-replacement candidates. But big names don’t always translate into big success. When you look long and hard under the hood at each, I have no idea who fits best at USC. And “fit” has to be emphasized because sometimes resumes don’t show whether someone is gonna fit or not, regardless… Read more »
Pete Kwiatkowski is a really good DC. He’s been a DC for 23 years and has had a lot of success. I wonder why he hasn’t taken a job yet. He doesn’t seem to be looking either because I don’t hear any rumors from the football pundants about where he is going to land. You usually hear that by now. Is it possible that he wants to come to SC and SC has told him that there is a 95% chance that Lynn is leaving and they want him as their next DC if he is still available? So he… Read more »
Possible replacements per Google AI Top Candidates (External) Pete Kwiatkowski: A strong contender from the Chris Peterson coaching tree, known for CFP defenses at Washington and Texas; he’s available after his Texas departure.Jim Leonhard: A popular former candidate and successful NFL assistant (Broncos), though an NFL return is a challenge.Mark Stoops: Recently fired from Kentucky, Stoops could bring major motivation and experience to the Trojans, say Sports Illustrated.Corey Hetherman: Miami’s DC, another name mentioned in discussions for the Trojans. Internal/Co-Coordinator Possibilities Eric Henderson & Rob Ryan (Co-DC): USC could promote from within, with DL coach Henderson and LB coach Ryan… Read more »
I would think nobody is going with Lynn to PSU. PeteK is known to most of the staff already and would meld right in. A new LB coach would be great and Pete K is a LB coach himself. Tony White is the guy they pursued previously but couldn’t put it together.
Hopefully, USC football has already done its own extensive, focused homework here and is ready to make this huge move based on availability, demands, previous experience, strong connections, and defensive scheme prefs. It would also be nice if he has any strong recruiting talent whatsoever and is a good evaluator of talent.
Have we forgotton what Lynn did at ucla, and then Riley was able to steal him away and we all thought he really picked a winner. What happened? Was it lack of talent? Did Lynn change how he coaches?
I don’t know, I just have untrained eyes, but probably a combo of things. He was only at ucla one year, it’s quite possible he had the gelling of an upperclassmen heavy group with more talent than he’s had at USC. It’s also possible that ucla might have regressed in his 2nd and/or 3rd years too. I’m going by results and what I saw in the 2 games I went to in person with a more panoramic view of the field. The line gaps were huge so often for opposing runners, and the secondary usually played so far off the… Read more »
Antonio Morales/Bruce Feldman (The Athletic) — “This is obvious, but Lynn’s schemes worked better at UCLA when he had an outstanding pass rush. He made things work at USC, but was limited because he didn’t have any true difference-makers on the defensive line.”
Lincoln Riley calls out Notre Dame and blames the Irish for pausing rivalry with USC Dan Morrison (on3.com) — The USC Trojans and Notre Dame Fighting Irish are two of the iconic brands in college football and have one of the game’s premier rivalries. However, they’re now taking at least a brief hiatus from playing one another, with plenty of finger pointing going around. Recently, USC head coach Lincoln Riley pointed his finger squarely at Notre Dame for pausing the series. At his press conference before the Alamo Bowl, Riley called out the Irish and said that the Trojans had a policy of… Read more »
Here’s a Notre Dame counter argument (SlaptheSign.com) Oliver Vandervoort — Give Lincoln Riley credit; he knows his audience. He knows that all he had to do was offer some defense for canceling the longest-running rivalry series in the game, and the easily misled USC faithful would echo it as fact. However, if someone really listens to what Riley said, it belies his true intention, which was always to kill the rivalry at some point. “With a scenario and a proposal that would extend the series for the next two years. We took Notre Dame at their word that they would play us… Read more »
The author bases his entire response on a Week 0 or bust assumption. Riley never said Week 0 from anything I read. I’m sure USC would have accepted a Week 1 or 2 game.
I read the ON3 Notre Dame board and they are calling Riley every name in the book. When ND comes back down to earth perhaps something can be worked out with them, but right now they are assuming they are so far above everyone else they do not have bend in the least.
Notre Dame wanted to continue the rivalry, as long as it on their terms 100%. No other blue blood program would schedule the Irish during the middle of conference season, or the last game, one week after their crosstown rival. It worked to their advantage, and the Irish were unwilling to give that up. Very disingenuous of Notre Dame to say they just want to play SC, when in reality they won’t play them in September.
It is notable that Penn State was able to pry Lynn, a former Nittany Lion player, away from a fellow hopeful Big Ten contender in USC. After going a combined 15-11 in 2023 and 2024, USC enters Tuesday’s Alamo Bowl matchup with TCU with a 9-3 record. Next year figures to be a pivotal one for Riley’s tenure with the Trojans.
What does D’Anton Lynn’s departure mean for USC? Antonio Morales/Bruce Feldman (The Athletic) — The Trojans didn’t field a top-25 defense, which their fans hoped for this season, but that wasn’t realistic because USC had too many personnel deficiencies. Multiple things can be true: Lynn didn’t have a great season in 2025 — USC got mashed in its three biggest games (Illinois, Notre Dame and Oregon) — but the defense definitely improved during his time with the program. But it leaves Lincoln Riley in an interesting spot. Lynn is the best DC he’s had in his time as a… Read more »
We hope LR would have learned the value of an average to good defense like we had in 2024. The top 10+ head coaches of course already know the value of a good defense as it’s mandatory for a natty. It’s all in the statistics, which we hope LR has looked at for “learning on the job” purposes. Administratively we have some top firepower in Jen and Bowden thus let them make this critical hire heading into a meat grinder schedule in 2026.
Let’s give Lincoln Riley some credit. He finally came out publicly and took a hard core stand against Notre Dame’s refusing to accept a totally reasonable USC scheduling plan to go forward. Notre Dame decided it would rather play BYU than USC.
Eventually, I think USC and ND will be playing again. Maybe ND won’t have a special side deal to get into the POs then. I won’t be holding my breath until it happens, but I would imagine it’ll be quite a donnybrook whenever it occurs.
The notion that LR was running away from competition I think is over blown. It never made sense to me to keep playing ND in October and especially at the end of November. I think ND’s schedule will continue to deteriorate. Looking at their ’26 schedule, 3 of the worst teams in the Big10, 3 of the worst teams in the ACC, Rice, Navy. Their only challenges are Miami (at home), BYU and SMU (at home).
Allen as long as ND can get away with having a purposely pathetically weak schedule (see 2026 and beyond) and the CFB playoff committee looks the way as far as SOS, ND will be in no hurry to negotiate a schedule with us. ND will have a double digit spread for every game except Miami, which ND has at home. Just the 2026 schedule alone, even if they sweep, should put them on the bubble at best, except for their little side deal they made with CFB.
Watch ND seek out a true blue-blood like USC, and then agree to play that blue blood in September, just like USC wanted. Do you think that would make ND look petty? Or do you think ND should do exactly that to prop up their cupcake schedule? College football has become such a changed sport over the last few years. It’s hard for me to fathom where CFB is really headed. But with every day, USC v ND may become less important to me for all I know. Things change with time. I am happy that USC stood its ground… Read more »
With D’Anton Lynn moving on to PSU, I can’t help but feel he didn’t really improve certain aspect of team defense when it came to pressuring & sacking the opponent QB and running defense. Both were underachieving in his two years here. Was it due to the lack of the player ability, the lack of coaching or what? Why would Lynn walk away at a time when the #1 recruiting class is coming in with promising defensive players and thus show he can mold a top defensive team? Or was there a roadblock he felt he couldn’t overcome here?
USC chose Lincoln Riley over Matt Campbell. D’Anton Lynn chose Matt Campbell over Lincoln Riley. As the world turns …
USC has to beat TCU tonight in the Alamo Bowl. A loss would really set a bad tone heading into the soon-to-open portal period (Jan 2 – Jan 16).
It could simply be he saw more in Matt Campbell than he did last year in James Franklin. I think we all do. And now was his chance to go back to his alma mater Penn St. In a few years he will move on to DC in the NFL. Wish him well, just not against USC.
Chip Kelly is named OC at Northwestern. Can he repair his reputation? — Chip Kelly joins Northwestern as offensive coordinator after the Raiders fired him mid-season with a 2-9 record and mixed NFL head coaching results. — The hire comes after Kelly’s orchestration of Ohio State’s national championship offense, which he abandoned last year to pursue an NFL opportunity with Las Vegas. — Northwestern finished 15th in Big Ten scoring this season, giving Kelly a chance to rebuild his reputation at the program’s new $850-million stadium. Steve Henson (LA Times) — Chip Kelly didn’t land on his feet by… Read more »
I still think CK is a really great OC and that HC at NWU is a really good coach. CK was just not made for pro football. He’s 19-19 at NWU with 2 winning seasons out of 3 seasons that he has been there. That’s good at NWU. I’m glad SC doesn’t play them next year.
SC should win even though they are missing a lot of really good players. TCU is only losing 2 players….the QB and the Receiver. But those 2 players are 7th and 5th in the nation in their respective categories. Just those players are a large part of their offense(68%). Their running game is weak(under 1600 yards with a 3.9 average). Defensively, they are only rated 69th in the nation
I hope Lincoln Riley, Jen Cohen, and Chad Bowden all.work together on finding the DC replacement. This is a huge hire for the program.
Get it right and we are going to be in multiple CFP appearances. Get it wrong and we’ll be in 7-5 purgatory for many years.
Pete Kwiatkowski was a scapegoat for Texas’s failed season. In 2024 and 2025 they finished 4th and 29th in total defense. Considering that there is 130 some teams in the NCAA, that’s not bad. I never thought Sark was a great HC. A pretty good OC but not a HC. They couldn’t wait to get rid of him at Washington.
And so weirdly, USC was happy to oblige. Thanks Pat Haden. Ugh.
With Jen Cohen, a lot more is possible.
I don’t really keep track of the ‘Horns, but I wonder how much strong support Sark has in Austin now? He always seems to have a ceiling that’s slightly lower than hoped for.
TEXAS plays MICH in the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl on Dec. 31 in Orlando, Fla (12 noon PT). Whittingham, hired on Dec. 26, is already in Orlando, but interim HC Biff Poggi will be coaching the game for the Wolverines.
Jen Cohen…..she’s the best
As if we all didn’t know, getting this new DC hire right is massively important to USC’s immediate football future in 2026, and beyond. I can’t wait to see who Bowden, Cohen and Riley settle on. This is such a big deal. We’ve all read the names of the possible Lynn-replacement candidates. But big names don’t always translate into big success. When you look long and hard under the hood at each, I have no idea who fits best at USC. And “fit” has to be emphasized because sometimes resumes don’t show whether someone is gonna fit or not, regardless… Read more »
Pete Kwiatkowski is a really good DC. He’s been a DC for 23 years and has had a lot of success. I wonder why he hasn’t taken a job yet. He doesn’t seem to be looking either because I don’t hear any rumors from the football pundants about where he is going to land. You usually hear that by now. Is it possible that he wants to come to SC and SC has told him that there is a 95% chance that Lynn is leaving and they want him as their next DC if he is still available? So he… Read more »
If they are not going to hire Pete K, then the first call should go to Tony White.
Keep LR away from the DC hire. Let Bowden and Jen handle it.
74-yr old Pete Carroll is now 2-14 as HC of the brutally bad Raiders. How much longer can he last in Vegas? Would you bring him back?
I think he would make a great AD at SC!!!
I would find it hard to believe PC would come back just to be a DC. It would be a miracle he & Riley would work together.
Sorry about my confusing question. What I meant to say was, “Would you bring him back to coach the Raiders for another year?”
After this uber-horrid year with the Raiders, I might/would probably call an end to Pete’s wonderful career.
Possible replacements per Google AI Top Candidates (External) Pete Kwiatkowski: A strong contender from the Chris Peterson coaching tree, known for CFP defenses at Washington and Texas; he’s available after his Texas departure.Jim Leonhard: A popular former candidate and successful NFL assistant (Broncos), though an NFL return is a challenge.Mark Stoops: Recently fired from Kentucky, Stoops could bring major motivation and experience to the Trojans, say Sports Illustrated.Corey Hetherman: Miami’s DC, another name mentioned in discussions for the Trojans. Internal/Co-Coordinator Possibilities Eric Henderson & Rob Ryan (Co-DC): USC could promote from within, with DL coach Henderson and LB coach Ryan… Read more »
Looming questions for USC football now?
1) Will a new DC be comfortable retaining multiple USC defensive coaches?
2) Will LR look to elevate current USC secondary coach Doug Belk, who has DC experience after being HOU’s defensive play caller?
3) Will other USC coaches follow Lynn to PSU, or decide to coach elsewhere?
I would think nobody is going with Lynn to PSU. PeteK is known to most of the staff already and would meld right in. A new LB coach would be great and Pete K is a LB coach himself. Tony White is the guy they pursued previously but couldn’t put it together.
USC should be able to do better than Lynn.
Who are the great replacements?
Hopefully, USC football has already done its own extensive, focused homework here and is ready to make this huge move based on availability, demands, previous experience, strong connections, and defensive scheme prefs. It would also be nice if he has any strong recruiting talent whatsoever and is a good evaluator of talent.
If Nua takes the DC job at BYU that would leave an opening for Ed O to come in and take on the line, and he recruits great also.
Have we forgotton what Lynn did at ucla, and then Riley was able to steal him away and we all thought he really picked a winner. What happened? Was it lack of talent? Did Lynn change how he coaches?
I don’t know, I just have untrained eyes, but probably a combo of things. He was only at ucla one year, it’s quite possible he had the gelling of an upperclassmen heavy group with more talent than he’s had at USC. It’s also possible that ucla might have regressed in his 2nd and/or 3rd years too. I’m going by results and what I saw in the 2 games I went to in person with a more panoramic view of the field. The line gaps were huge so often for opposing runners, and the secondary usually played so far off the… Read more »
Antonio Morales/Bruce Feldman (The Athletic) — “This is obvious, but Lynn’s schemes worked better at UCLA when he had an outstanding pass rush. He made things work at USC, but was limited because he didn’t have any true difference-makers on the defensive line.”
Lincoln Riley calls out Notre Dame and blames the Irish for pausing rivalry with USC Dan Morrison (on3.com) — The USC Trojans and Notre Dame Fighting Irish are two of the iconic brands in college football and have one of the game’s premier rivalries. However, they’re now taking at least a brief hiatus from playing one another, with plenty of finger pointing going around. Recently, USC head coach Lincoln Riley pointed his finger squarely at Notre Dame for pausing the series. At his press conference before the Alamo Bowl, Riley called out the Irish and said that the Trojans had a policy of… Read more »
Here’s a Notre Dame counter argument (SlaptheSign.com) Oliver Vandervoort — Give Lincoln Riley credit; he knows his audience. He knows that all he had to do was offer some defense for canceling the longest-running rivalry series in the game, and the easily misled USC faithful would echo it as fact. However, if someone really listens to what Riley said, it belies his true intention, which was always to kill the rivalry at some point. “With a scenario and a proposal that would extend the series for the next two years. We took Notre Dame at their word that they would play us… Read more »
The author bases his entire response on a Week 0 or bust assumption. Riley never said Week 0 from anything I read. I’m sure USC would have accepted a Week 1 or 2 game.
I read the ON3 Notre Dame board and they are calling Riley every name in the book. When ND comes back down to earth perhaps something can be worked out with them, but right now they are assuming they are so far above everyone else they do not have bend in the least.
Notre Dame wanted to continue the rivalry, as long as it on their terms 100%. No other blue blood program would schedule the Irish during the middle of conference season, or the last game, one week after their crosstown rival. It worked to their advantage, and the Irish were unwilling to give that up. Very disingenuous of Notre Dame to say they just want to play SC, when in reality they won’t play them in September.
Good to see a little fight in the kid, for once.