Gold Plating: How Lincoln Riley Overhauled USC Football's Accountability System
Chris Carter, USC Football's Director of Player Development, is one of the men tasked with making sure each Trojan excels on and off the football field.
Keely Eure, Director of Creative Content and Team Reporter
8/31/2023
“Earn your spot.”
It’s a common mantra in the sports world, but what does it actually look like when it’s taken seriously and not just ‘coach speak?’
When applied to the world of college football, embracing that philosophy means a program has clear expectations of its players and a strict system of accountability.
Those were two tenets of USC’s football program which were in dire need of an overhaul when head coach Lincoln Riley first arrived on campus.
From the moment he arrived, Riley made it clear that every Trojan on his roster must continue to prove himself - both off and on the field - each and every day.
One of the initial steps to enforce this new era of USC football began in the office of Chris Carter, USC’s Director of Player Development. It took place several days after Carter first arrived on campus in January of 2022, when his office was still completely bare.
More than a year later, with an office now full of USC memorabilia, Carter recalls a seemingly mundane meeting with USC’s head coach that ultimately was one of the catalysts for the Trojans’ cultural overhaul and “Gold Plating” program.
“We were just sitting here brainstorming some cool things we could do to really inspire the guys, but more importantly, to make them compete, to exude a sense of pride, to enrich tradition,” Carter explained. “But we had to make it something that was unique to us.”
Carter arrived at USC by way of Oklahoma just one month after Riley’s arrival and was the perfect man for the task. He spent a large portion of his life on the east coast during his seven years in the NFL, but the 34-year-old is no stranger to USC and its illustrious history. He grew up just minutes away from the Coliseum.
“It was a bunch of superheroes living around the corner,” Carter recalled with a smile. “You wanted to be like them. And then the older we got, [USC’s football players] got even cooler because you're getting closer to that age, so it's becoming more of a reality for you…They were bigger than Tom Cruise or Will Smith at that time in my eyes.”
Carter’s childhood admiration and knowledge of USC came into play when Riley had suggestions that mirrored what other programs have done to reward its players - helmet stickers and other things of that nature.
“I was like, ‘That’s cool…but Lincoln, ‘SC is super traditional. They won’t even change their socks, their cleats! You know we’re not putting stickers on helmets,’” Carter said with a laugh.
“I think the first thing you want to do is change the culture,” Carter continued. “But you don’t change the history, you don’t change the brand and the tradition.”
Carter took a simple approach and suggested that each player earn the Trojan emblem that appears on their helmet on game days.
“I was like, ‘Why reinvent the wheel? Why not just take off the one that they have on there and make them earn it?’” Carter explained. “Because honestly, think about the tradition and the pride that comes behind that logo."
The concept, according to Carter, embodies USC’s strength and subtlety - a “say less, do more” type of mantra.
Riley embraced the idea on the condition that there would be clear criteria in order to earn the emblem and become Gold Plated.
“[The criteria] started with the question, ‘Who do we want our players to be?’’ Carter explained. “Well, we want them to be well-rounded men. It’s not just football - and I think that’s a big part of my job and why we sat in this office and created this vision.”
Carter’s role in the football program embodies Riley’s commitment to a larger vision of success for his student-athletes. The head coach’s idea of success is one that goes beyond the Coliseum walls and truly invests in the student-athlete as a human first.
As such, part of Carter’s role includes developing life plans for each student-athlete on Riley’s roster that involves everything outside of their football career. Each plan is carefully crafted after Carter spends at least an hour with each new player, learning about their hopes, talents and goals. Which means that when every player on USC’s roster was new to Carter in 2022, he spent over 100 hours solely in conversation with the team’s student-athletes.
“If our guys come in here and play football and then they leave, go out to the world and they're terrible fathers and husbands or brothers or friends and contributing members to society, ultimately that's a stain on our program and that's a stain on our brand,” Carter said.
"'Why reinvent the wheel? Why not just take off the one that they have on there and make them earn it?’ Because honestly, think about the tradition and the pride that comes behind that logo."
- - Chris Carter
Carter’s role is an embodiment of another tenet of Riley’s program: accountability. Each person in Riley’s program is accountable for their actions both on the field and off it. It’s a core belief that ultimately asks the question: Why strive to be great if your “greatness” is compartmentalized to just one area of your life?
“We teach our guys all the time, you are a summation of what you do,” Carter continued. “So whatever you repetitively do over and over and over and over and over again, that's essentially who you are to the world, whether you feel that way or not. That's just what it is. And so you'll get Gold-Plated based off of that.”
From leadership skills to classroom attendance to treatment of janitorial staff, Gold Plating monitors “the whole picture” of what it means to be a great student-athlete at USC.
“How are you treating your professors? How are you treating your tutors? Are you showing up on time, getting all your stuff done consistently? Because we monitor all those things,” Carter said. “Are you taking care of your body? Are you handling stuff in the weight room?”
As a result, Carter has created an environment where he receives any and all feedback on how a player on the team is conducting himself.
“If any of our staff members sees a guy walking around here, just being disrespectful, acting rude - all of that comes back [to me],” Carter explained. “I think we've created a sense of community where we don't like that, we don't respect that, and we won't tolerate it.
“So the second somebody does something like that, we've created safe avenues for people to vocalize that,” Carter continued. “And we don't necessarily publicize it, we just let you know, ‘Okay, if this is how you're going to act, this is going to be the result of it. This is the consequence.’”
While the Gold Plating program has become a means of keeping players in “good standing,” it has also fostered an environment where everyone is striving to be their best.
“I think when you put an emphasis on all these, I would say, moral and ethical areas in the players' lives, you start to see the benefits on the academic side,” Carter explained. “We had 15 guys on the dean's list last year, we broke the school GPA record [as a team], everyone was eligible for the bowl game. And that’s in Year One.”
“I think it is just a testament to how the guys attached themselves to [Gold Plating] and took heed to it,” Carter said. “They were committed to their greatness.”
USC’s commitment, both as a staff and as players, to USC’s Gold Plating program was reinforced during Riley’s first training camp as head coach. After each spring practice in 2022, the Trojans would hold an informal ceremony where a Trojan alum would return to campus, attend practice and ultimately surprise and award current players with their accomplishment of earning their Gold Plate.
The concept was Carter’s way of involving and honoring USC’s past. It was an opportunity to pave a new pathway forward with the proverbial blessing of Trojan greats, who were also aching to see USC return to glory.
“USC has such a rich history and that’s the whole point of us doing the whole Gold Plated thing,” Carter explained. “What good is it for us to take off [the logo] and make them earn it if we don't tap into that rich history and show people why they need to be so proud to earn that logo? So we started reaching out to all the alumni who were dying to get back here.”
Truthfully, it was also somewhat of a shot in the dark for Carter to initially reach out to the school’s legends - because at the end of the day, the concept of Gold Plating was just something he made up. The director of player development made sure to master his pitch before reaching out to generations of Trojan greats.
“Fortunately, I don't get super nervous because I played in the NFL for a long time too. But these guys, they're great at what they do. Their time is precious,” Carter said. “They don't like to be bothered. But what trumps all of that is the fact that they love USC. They're so eager to take a call from us when we reach out for help.”
The first alumnus to kick off the team’s first Gold Plating ceremony was none other than college football and NFL legend Ronnie Lott. It probably doesn’t come as a surprise, but the hall of famer immediately set the tone.
“Everybody had chills at the end of it, and it was a 10-minute speech!” Carter recalled enthusiastically.
“We were just so honored and grateful that somebody with so much going on, of that much prestige, would do that for the players,” Carter said. “This man flew on his own dime down here to practice just to present Gold Plates and went right back to his plane and flew right back to San Francisco.”
“I’ve got to admit, the Trojan alumni are unlike any other. These people bend over backwards,” Carter said with an amazed grin.
From Mark Sanchez to Marqise Lee, many Trojan greats have stopped by Howard Jones Field to participate in USC’s Gold Plating ceremony and impart wisdom on a new generation of Trojan athletes. The team kneels in a huddle after each practice and listens to what each alum has to share. It’s a message that proves especially powerful given that the person standing in front of them has been in their exact shoes.
“Trojan alumni, all these guys make themselves so readily available for us. And I think it's because they remember what it was like to have a dream, to have that twinkle in your eye,” Carter said. “I think we all do.”
At the end of their speech, the honored guest of each practice reads off which player or players has earned their Gold Plate. While the Trojan emblem is not physically passed out each ceremony, each alum and player gets a special Gold Plated shirt that only they can possess. It’s a physical token of the work each Trojan has put in both on and off the field.
“We wanted it to be exclusive, so you can't buy it anywhere,” Carter shared. “Not even any of the coaches get it. Nobody else is getting it on the side. We only make enough for the players who earn it.”
The public nature of the Gold Plating ceremony also reinforces the importance of accountability. A quick glance at the helmet on USC’s practice field can identify those who have been awarded. It makes it easy to recognize who has done the work, and everyone celebrates those who have.
“As a staff, we loved how the team has attached themselves to it and how they enjoy it,” Carter said. “The guys get excited at the end of practice when guys are getting Gold Plated. So it's cool to see the guys recognize, respect and celebrate each other so much. You don't see that in most teams. I think with the competitive nature and the environment that you breed, oftentimes that gets a little bit lost in it in terms of celebrating your brothers.”
That’s ultimately what it boils down to for Riley and his program: cultivating an environment that fosters hardwork and a sense of brotherhood. If USC is going to reach the pinnacle of college football once again, it’s going to take discipline, determination, and hard work both on and off the field. So far, that seems to be evident in the success of the team’s Gold Plating program.
“As these young men go on into the world, so much is going to be expected of them, and I think that’s what we based the Gold Plated program off of,” Carter reflected. “So much is going to be expected of you and no one is going to give you excuses. They’re just going to expect results.”
putting in the work ???? pic.twitter.com/7sLplrZUc5
— USC Football ?? (@uscfb) August 30, 2023
Earned daily ??????@Ducerobinson2 pic.twitter.com/eUnsqoArV2
— USC Football ?? (@uscfb) August 17, 2023
