Orgeron returned to USC's assistant coaching staff on January 12, 2010, after Kiffin resigned from the University of Tennessee without notice to accept the USC head coach position vacated by Pete Carroll (who had returned to head coaching in the NFL).
Orgeron was one of the highest paid assistant coaches in the Pac-12 Conference, with an annual salary of $650,000.

It was announced on September 29, 2013—after Lane Kiffin's firing—that Orgeron would be the interim head coach of the Trojans for the rest of the 2013 season, until athletic director Pat Haden found a permanent replacement.

After his experience at Ole Miss, Orgeron decided to approach his second stint as a head coach differently.
 Instead of resuming the intense aggressiveness he had used as a defensive line and head coach, he used a different approach this time.
 Orgeron applied behavioral techniques he had used on his own teenage children, in an effort to approach his USC players "like my sons".

After receiving much praise for their upset win at home over highly ranked Stanford, the Trojans suffered a humiliating 35–14 defeat to cross-town-rivals UCLA—for the second year in a row—on November 30, 2013.
This greatly threatened Orgeron's chances of winning the permanent head coach position.
 The Trojans were 6–2 under Orgeron, finishing the regular season with a 9–4 record.
 On December 2, 2013, ESPN reported that another former USC assistant coach under Pete Carroll—Washington head coach Steve Sarkisian—had accepted USC's offer to become the next Trojans head coach.
After Orgeron was passed over for the job, he resigned.
Orgeron returned to USC's assistant coaching staff on January 12, 2010, after Kiffin resigned from the University of Tennessee without notice to accept the USC head coach position vacated by Pete Carroll (who had returned to head coaching in the NFL). Orgeron was one of the highest paid assistant coaches in the Pac-12 Conference, with an annual salary of $650,000.
It was announced on September 29, 2013—after Lane Kiffin's firing—that Orgeron would be the interim head coach of the Trojans for the rest of the 2013 season, until athletic director Pat Haden found a permanent replacement.
After his experience at Ole Miss, Orgeron decided to approach his second stint as a head coach differently.  Instead of resuming the intense aggressiveness he had used as a defensive line and head coach, he used a different approach this time.  Orgeron applied behavioral techniques he had used on his own teenage children, in an effort to approach his USC players "like my sons".
After receiving much praise for their upset win at home over highly ranked Stanford, the Trojans suffered a humiliating 35–14 defeat to cross-town-rivals UCLA—for the second year in a row—on November 30, 2013. This greatly threatened Orgeron's chances of winning the permanent head coach position.  The Trojans were 6–2 under Orgeron, finishing the regular season with a 9–4 record.  On December 2, 2013, ESPN reported that another former USC assistant coach under Pete Carroll—Washington head coach Steve Sarkisian—had accepted USC's offer to become the next Trojans head coach. After Orgeron was passed over for the job, he resigned.
Ed Orgeron