Alabama coach Kalen DeBoer would be at the top of USC’s list if the Trojans moved on from Lincoln Riley, according to John Talty of CBS Sports and 247Sports.
Talty called it an open secret in the industry in a clip 247Sports posted to X on Thursday. He pointed to DeBoer’s history with USC athletic director Jen Cohen.
“It’s kind of an open secret, I would say, in the industry that if USC were to make a move, that Alabama’s Kalen DeBoer would be at the top of the list,” Talty said. “Jen and Kalen had obviously previously worked together at Washington. And so that’s what I was talking about earlier with the potential dominoes. Things could get real wild, real fast if a couple of things go a certain way.”
Cohen hired DeBoer at Washington on Nov. 29, 2021, a day after Mike Bohn, then USC’s athletic director, hired Riley away from Oklahoma.
In two seasons in Seattle, DeBoer went 25-3. Michigan beat his 2023 Huskies 34-13 in the national championship game, and Alabama hired him that offseason to replace Nick Saban.
Riley is 41-20 at USC and has not reached the College Football Playoff in five seasons.
“Listen, if I didn’t want to be at this place, I wouldn’t have come here in the first place. I’ve had plenty of opportunities to leave,” Riley said after practice Tuesday. “This is where I want to be. This is the right place for me. I’m the right person to be here.”
Wisconsin beat USC 24-7 on Saturday, dropping the Trojans to 6-2 and 3-2 in Big Ten play. Seven points were the lowest total for any team Riley has coached. Oregon beat the Trojans 41-27 on Sept. 26.
In April, DeBoer signed a seven-year, $87.5 million deal with Alabama that runs through Jan. 31, 2033. His buyout is $10 million through Jan. 31, 2027, and $8 million for the year after that.
Indiana beat Alabama 38-3 in the Rose Bowl quarterfinal last season, ending an 11-4 year. DeBoer’s first team in Tuscaloosa went 9-4 in 2024.
Down 20-17 entering the fourth quarter Saturday, Alabama scored the last 14 points and beat Texas A&M 31-20 in Tuscaloosa. Georgia had beaten the Crimson Tide on Oct. 10, and Tennessee did the same a week later in Knoxville.
“Just proud of the guys and the way they fought for four quarters, and the way they finished especially, just continued to stay with it,” DeBoer said. “Guys coming in and out of the game, they wanted to finish and wanted to be out there, coming off the sideline and going out there and giving everything they got. So, at different times in the game, it could have gone the other way, but our guys kept finding a way to make a play and keep them out of the end zone.”
“There’s plays that we definitely know we need to make. There’s execution that needed to be better early in the game,” DeBoer continued. “And so, we knew that they were a team, if you look at their scores, even in other games in the first half, even close to the end of the second quarter, those games were close.”
Saturday brings Ohio State to the Coliseum, with kickoff at 7:30 p.m. ET. After that, USC goes to Indiana on Nov. 14, hosts Maryland on Nov. 21 and finishes with UCLA.
Alabama has an open date Saturday before its Nov. 7 trip to LSU.
