What We Learned: South Carolina at SECMD

SEC Media Days is underway and three of head coaches that will compete against Kentucky this fall took the podium on Monday.

South Carolina, Ole Miss, and Vanderbilt met with the league's media to kick off talking season and we're updating you on everything said.

We start with South Carolina and Shane Beamer.

** Beamer spoke about there being a lot of new faces on the offensive side of the ball. They're replacing Spencer Rattler and Xavier Leggette. They have several new coaches on the offensive side of the ball. Beamer noted that Mike Shula is on staff working with quarterbacks.

** Beamer said they have to run the ball and protect the quarterback better than they did last year. They had two true freshmen on the offensive line at times last year. They had some struggles up front last year but believes they will be better for it this year.

** Beamer noted this is their fourth year in their defensive system and said he believes they played well on that side of the ball down the stretch.

** He also noted that South Carolina leads the SEC in takeaways since 2021. Beamer said they have to continue to force turnovers. He believes they have more talent, depth, and athleticism on all three levels of their defense than last year.

** Debo Williams was the Defensive MVP last year. The top six vote getters for Defensive MVP are all back, Beamer noted. "We've got a core group of guys returning," he said.

** South Carolina loses a rock star special teams coordinator, who is now Buffalo's head coach, and that's going to be a tough guy to replace. His replacement had NFL special teams coordinator options. Beamer noted special teams is his own background. They've led the SEC in blocked kicks since 2021.

** Beamer said he really likes their team. "Most of you don't," Beamer said to the media. He expects them to be picked toward the bottom of the conference. But he says they have a lot of good young talent with veteran leadership. More than 20 players on the team are going into their fifth season of college football.

** Beamer said their expectations are to compete for the 12-team playoff "year in, year out." They have players who stayed at USC "and they didn't stay to be average, to go 6-6."

** Asked about the quarterback situation with LaNorris Sellers presumed to be the starter, Beamer said Rattler was an elite player and "we're certainly going to look different." Both players competing for the job are 240-pound type guys who can run and throw. That brings a new dimension to the offense. Their competition has made them better. Beamer noted that Luke Doty started games at QB in 2020. There's experience but not a lot of experience at South Carolina.

"We return a lot of players around those guys, which will help," he said, noting that Vershon Lee started at center, guard and tackle. Beamer said they have been working on the offense for this group since January and it's a young, hungry group.

** Beamer said the size, depth, and athleticism on the line of scrimmage is the difference in the SEC. He said in other leagues there may be one or two other defensive linemen you have to be aware of, but in the SEC it's "six or seven every single Saturday."

** Asked about the addition of OU and Texas, and how it makes his job tougher, Beamer said it's a great move and a testament to Greg Sankey. "Competition is a core value of our program and we're all about competing." Beamer said they aren't far off. They've had some fantastic wins over big name teams. He said South Carolina has shown it has the potential to be in that playoff conversation.

** Asked what it will take to get optimism back to late 2022 territory, Beamer noted that 5-7 was not the season anybody expected. They were picked as a darkhorse team in the SEC. But he reiterates they were not far away from the narrative being completely different.

** Arkansas RB transfer Rocket Sanders is doing well, Beamer said. "Hungry and starving," he said. He has a great desire to get back to the Sanders of 2022. Beamer said a lot of people have forgotten how good he was. Quinshon Judkins and Sanders were the top two running backs in the SEC. Beamer said he's worked hard to get healthy. It's been a process with the S&C and training staff. He's shaved 6% of his body fat and lost a considerable amount of weight. Beamer said he stayed in Columbia all of May while most of the team had left.

** It was noted that USC took more transfers than HS kids. Beamer said they always want to start with HS recruiting. What will help them this year is they started five true freshmen and three of those didn't arrive until the summer. In their incoming class all but three were in for the spring this year.

Here's more of what was said by South Carolina players and Beamer at and away from the main podium courtesy of the USC Rivals site.

"South Carolina’s defense did noticeably improve last November after mixing in a 3-3-5 scheme along with its base 4-2-5. Allowing a total of 29 points over the final three games of the regular season, a 2-1 stretch against Vanderbilt, Kentucky and Clemson.

"Now 10 of the top 12 tacklers from last season’s defense are back, as are nine of the top 12 in sacks and 11 of the 14 who topped the charts in pass breakups. Debo Williams is back as the glue at middle linebacker a year after his 113 tackles were the most by a Gamecock defender since 2002."

Veteran Defense Embracing High Expectations: 'It's Not Really A Pressure'

Beamer Says The Gamecocks Have No Ceiling

Beamer's Off Podium Quotes, via Alan Cole:

On the injury front:

“We’ll get back in as a staff next week and get an update injury wise, but at this point everybody is good and guys that were limited in spring practice are full speed ahead. Rocket Sanders and those guys have had a great summer from a health standpoint, and we expect everybody to be full go once we get going.”

On the theme for this pre-season: “The theme going all the way back to January would be the hunger that this team has. We’ve got three fantastic leaders here today that have played a lot of football for us here at South Carolina, along with a lot of other leaders. When you think about it, two of the guys that we brought to media days last year are still on our team in Tonka [Hemingway] and Kai [Kroeger] as well. We’re an older team that’s very, very hungry. They’ve shown that since August. The theme for us is just to continue to build on that and embrace that.”

“We’ve got a lot of new faces obviously, coaches and players, and will continue to get acclimated and just get better. But I really like this group. I like the way they’ve worked since January. They’ve had a fantastic summer, and we’re eager to get going.”

Said Boogie Huntley and Debo Williams were voted as permanent captains by their teammates at the end of last season, part of why they are at Media Days this year.

On analysts now being allowed to coach on-field and if he’s in favor of that rule change: “Absolutely I am. Every school is going to be different. You may have some coaches that just hire an army of analysts, and you’ve seen that. Some coaches in the last 2-3 months have left some coordinator jobs at the FCS level to go be an analyst somewhere else, and more power to them. But I think it’s great. It takes kind of the gray area out of who’s allowed to do what. We try to do things the right way at our place, but not everybody I don’t think has always followed that rule the way it’s supposed to be followed.”