{"id":422316,"date":"2026-01-22T06:07:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T06:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/422316\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T06:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T06:07:11","slug":"usc-targeting-gary-patterson-to-lead-defense-sources-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/422316\/","title":{"rendered":"USC targeting Gary Patterson to lead defense, sources say"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Jan 21, 2026, 06:05 PM ET<\/p>\n<p><a data-clubhouse-guid=\"63d7a1b4-ee19-f0ae-33c5-42a14e000fb8\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/college-football\/team\/_\/id\/30\/usc-trojans\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">USC<\/a> is targeting former TCU coach Gary Patterson to be the school&#8217;s next defensive coordinator, sources told ESPN&#8217;s Pete Thamel on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>Patterson would replace D&#8217;Anton Lynn, who left the Trojans earlier this month to take on the same role at Penn State, his alma mater.<\/p>\n<p>Editor&#8217;s Picks<a name=\"&amp;lpos=story:editorspicks:inline:1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/nfl\/draft2026\/story\/_\/id\/46573669\/2026-nfl-draft-rankings-mel-kiper-big-board-top-prospects-players-positions\" class=\"img-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/r1600631_1296x1296_1-1.jpg&#038;w=130&#038;h=130&#038;scale=crop&#038;location=center.jpeg\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/a><a name=\"&amp;lpos=story:editorspicks:inline:2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/college-football\/story\/_\/id\/47467021\/2026-ncaa-football-transfer-portal-best-players\" class=\"img-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/r1594751_1296x1296_1-1.jpg&#038;w=130&#038;h=130&#038;scale=crop&#038;location=center.jpeg\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>1 Related<\/p>\n<p>The defensive-minded Patterson is the winningest coach in TCU history, having gone 181-79 in 22 seasons with the Horned Frogs. He was let go by the school during the 2021 season.<\/p>\n<p>Since that exit, Patterson spent brief stints at Texas as a special assistant to coach Steve Sarkisian in 2022, and then as a consultant at Baylor for part of 2024.<\/p>\n<p>Coach Lincoln Riley and USC went 9-4 this past season, losing to Patterson&#8217;s former team, TCU, in the Valero Alamo Bowl last month.<\/p>\n<p>Lynn guided the Trojans&#8217; defense for two seasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jan 21, 2026, 06:05 PM ET USC is targeting former TCU coach Gary Patterson to be the school&#8217;s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422317,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[399,398,396,397,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-422316","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-ncaafootball","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422316"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422316\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}