LOS ANGELES — When Chip Kelly was making a name for himself at Oregon more than a decade ago, a 28-year-old first-year offensive coordinator was taking notes from across the country.

It was Lincoln Riley, a name that would soon become a household one in college football when he coached at Oklahoma and – 12 years later – against Kelly in Los Angeles at USC.

Call it a cliché full-circle moment, or maybe just a young East Carolina coach studying the new-fangled thing in college football at the time: Kelly’s revolutionary up-tempo spread offense that created a scoring machine at Oregon.

“Obviously, they were doing a phenomenal job offensively at that point,” Riley said of Kelly last week. “They were doing some really unique things, especially in the run game and in terms of tempo and all that. He’s absolutely somebody you watched from afar and admired. I’ve always had a lot of respect for him both in and out.”

Riley was just starting to move up the coaching ranks, serving as the offensive coordinator at East Carolina from 2010 to 2014 until he joined Oklahoma’s staff. Riley said he admired Kelly’s offense that took the college football world by storm in the early 2010s, and that he “absolutely” took note of Kelly’s schemes.

“That just means that I’m old,” Kelly joked when asked Tuesday about Riley’s praise.

Kelly, who at 58 is a full two decades older than Riley, added the respect is mutual and said Riley has “made a major impact on college football,” with a 55-10 record in five years at Oklahoma that included mentoring the likes of Kyler Murray, Baker Mayfield and Jalen Hurts.

“I have a lot of respect for Lincoln,” Kelly said. “I think he’s a heck of a coach. I admire him.”

By 2015, Riley had taken over for Bob Stoops as Oklahoma’s head coach, while Kelly was struggling to transfer his collegiate success to the NFL. When Kelly returned to the Pac-12 in 2018, Riley and his potent Air Raid offense were in the midst of a dominant run with the Sooners that led to USC tapping him to revitalize its program this offseason.

“He’s been somebody I’ve always looked up to in the business,” Riley said of Kelly. “He’s done a phenomenal job. We’ve had a good time in the chances we’ve been around each other and had a chance to communicate, so I would expect that to continue.”

The two have faced each other as coaches twice, with Riley winning both matchups when UCLA played Oklahoma in a home-and-home series in 2018 and 2019.

Now, the two are in the same city but in different positions: Kelly looking to build upon his best season with UCLA in year five and Riley hoping to start anew at USC.

Riley’s hiring at USC and subsequent roster overhaul likely stole some of the offseason thunder from UCLA, which for the first time in Kelly’s tenure has a chance to build off a winning season with several key players returning.

Kelly wasn’t too keen on commenting last week on Riley’s “next level” use of the transfer portal this offseason to bring in 13 transfers – including bringing highly touted quarterback Caleb Williams with him from Oklahoma.

“I don’t know what you mean by next level,” Kelly said, adding that every team in college football uses the transfer portal and that players should have a choice in where they want to play.

Kelly then pointed out a few players that he’s signed off the portal: Zach Charbonnet, Obi Eboh and Cam Johnson. Perhaps it was a subtle shrug at what his new crosstown rival coach was doing.

But don’t expect much of a back-and-forth between Kelly and Riley moving forward, with Kelly welcoming him into the Pac-12 coach’s fraternity.

“That’s the good thing about this league is there’s good coaches everywhere,” Kelly said. “(Stanford’s) David Shaw, (Utah’s) Kyle Whittingham, Lincoln — there’s a bunch of really, really good coaches in this league and you gotta be ready every single week. I think Lincoln’s a heck of a football coach.”

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Notes

Kelly said all of the transfer players who have shown up so far have impressed him with how quickly they’ve been picking up the system, including cornerback Azizi Hearn from Wyoming and edge rushers Gabriel and Grayson Murphy, the twins from North Texas. …

Defensive back Martell Irby and offensive linemen Thomas Cole and Patrick Selna are still with the program, according to Kelly. Irby is available while Cole and Selna are “unavailable.”