The initial reaction around the college football world to Shane Beamer’s hire as South Carolina’s Head Coach in December 2020 was, understandably, rather dubious. Even the South Carolina fan base who was so deeply invested in his success wanted to believe, but were not exactly sure what they were getting in Beamer. Sure, as the son of the legendary Virginia Tech Head Coach Frank Beamer, he had the pedigree and he had apprenticed under the likes of Kirby Smart, Lincoln Riley, and Steve Spurrier, but could a first-time head coach really turn a program that has won exactly one conference title in its history into a championship contender in the most unforgiving conference in the country that, oh by the way, currently features two programs that have won four of the last six national championships?
The championship question remains to be answered, but after an 8-4 regular season that was capped by two wins over top-10 teams that sent shockwaves through the college football landscape, all of the Cocks out there are all in on their young head coach.
The late-season victories over Tennessee and Clemson to close out the 2022 regular season have sent the expectations among the South Carolina fan base unapologetically to the moon. A neutral observer, however, is left to wonder whether those twin victories over the Vols and Tigers – as impressive as they were – are forerunners of unprecedented program success to come or cruel mirages that will only set the stage for yet another soul-crushing disappointment for Cocks everywhere in 2023.
WIN TOTAL: 6.5
PREDICTION: UNDER
CONFIDENCE: 6/10
OFFENSE
Not surprisingly, given the outsized importance of the position in modern college football, last season, South Carolina went as quarterback Spencer Rattler went. The Gamecocks were inconsistent and decidedly average for most of the 2022 season because Rattler was inconsistent and decidedly average for most of the season. However, when the Oklahoma transfer played out of his mind against Tennessee and Clemson to end the season, the team at large played out of its mind and knocked two national title contenders out of the College Football Playoff picture. Funny how that happens, huh?
This begs the question: who is the real Spencer Rattler? Is he the guy who averaged 399 yards passing along with tossing 8 touchdowns and only 2 interceptions against Tennessee and Clemson late in the season or is he the guy that only averaged 193 yards passing with a 5 touchdown to 7 interception split in the other seven games he played against Power 5 opponents in 2022?
The faithful Cocks, as you might imagine, are convinced Rattler found the mojo he left back in high school during that late season surge and will be that version of himself for the entirety of the 2023 season as the Gamecocks push Georgia for the SEC Eastern Division crown.
I guess that’s cool and all. I mean, you do you, Cocks.
But as a betting man, I have a responsibility to myself and to all of you reading this who take my predictions as gospel truth to act responsibly and acting responsibly means putting my faith in the larger sample size. The simple fact is Rattler has a far longer history of being a perfectly average quarterback than he does being an elite quarterback. To this point in his career, his two-game stretch to end the 2022 regular season is the clear anomaly. Could he bottle it up and have a monster 2023 season? Sure, I guess. But I am going to put my faith in Rattler reverting back to exactly what he has been for the vast majority of his career. Perfectly average.
If South Carolina was loaded with skill talent around Rattler, I might be more inclined to consider the over, but there just isn’t much proven talent for Rattler to work with. The obvious exception, of course, is Antwane “Juice” Wells who might very quietly be the best returning receiver in the SEC this season. Wells gives Rattler an Alpha to work with at WR, but the complimentary pieces are uninspiring at best.
The prospect of fifth-year senior Xavier Legette starting opposite of Wells, a guy who has only managed to post a paltry 423 total yards receiving through his first four college seasons, should be a serious red flag for those betting on the Gamecock offense to take a giant leap forward this year. After losing their top two tight ends from 2022 to transfer, the Gamecocks hit the portal themselves to bring in Arkansas transfer Trey Knox. As a converted wide receiver, Knox brings athleticism to the position and did post a career year last season, but he still only has 507 yards receiving from the tight end position over the past three seasons. He does have promise as a pass catcher, but he is still very much a liability in the run game. The most intriguing prospect on the South Carolina offense in 2023 is transfer receiver Eddie Lewis who previously spent time at Rutgers and Memphis. At Memphis in 2022, Lewis hauled in 41 passes for 603 yards. At 5-foot-11, 190-pounds, Lewis projects as a slot receiver and could be the complimentary option to Wells the Gamecocks so desperately need.
Losing three of their top four rushers from a year ago, the Gamecocks also enter the 2023 season without an obvious answer at running back. Junior JuJu McDowell is projected to open the season as the starter, but to this point he has shown nothing to suggest that he is a big-time SEC running back. To throw more cold water on their running back situation, the two guys pushing McDowell for playing time are a transfer from something called Newberry College and a dude who used to play quarterback for the Gamecocks.
The questionable running back situation could be mitigated by a strong offensive line, but unfortunately for the merry band of Cocks in Columbia, that is a luxury they do not enjoy. Coming into spring practice, the Gamecocks already knew they would have to replace their top three lineman by snap count from a year ago, but the situation got considerably uglier for Carolina when their projected starter at left tackle Jalen Nichols went down with what Beamer described as a “significant knee injury.” At this point the South Carolina offensive line is going to feature a who’s who of dudes that have no business starting in the SEC.
Oh, and let’s not forget that, on top of it all, the Gamecocks will be working in a brand new offensive coordinator who has never actually been good at the job. In defending the hire of Dowell Loggains to replace Marcus Satterfield, Beamer highlighted Loggains’ NFL experience, but what he conveniently failed to mention was the fact that while Loggains has spent parts of seven seasons as an NFL offensive coordinator, his offenses routinely finished near the bottom of the league in yards per game and only cracked the top 20 once in all of his years as an NFL coordinator.
So let’s do the math here.
A wildly inconsistent QB + only one proven offensive skill weapon + an offensive line that is going to get somebody murdered + a hack offensive coordinator = you better have one hell of a defense to get to seven wins with that schedule.
DEFENSE
With the unstable situation on offense, South Carolina is going to need its defense to do the heavy lifting. The problem is, they don’t have the dudes to do it. The Gamecocks lost their best players at each level of the defense and only return four starters from a unit that finished 11th in the SEC in yards per play last season. According to ESPN’s resident college football numbers guy Bill Connelly, Carolina only returns 48% of its production from a year ago, ranking them 113th nationally in that category. For a program that does not historically recruit at Georgia and Alabama levels, its simply far too much to ask for them to find a way to effectively replace all of that lost production in one season with players that will raise the defense’s overall level of play to compensate for what will be yet another inconsistent Carolina offense.
After being granted a seventh-year of collegiate eligibility defensive end Jordan Strachan – who led the FBS in sacks back in 2020 when he played for Georgia State – is not only a contender for the Van Wilder All-American Team, but is probably their best returning player on defense. Defensive lineman Alex Huntley has also flashed playmaking ability at times during his career but has struggled with consistency. Outside of those two players, though, it’s big fat questions marks everywhere else for the Gamecock defense. Pro-Tip: teams with that many question marks usually kind of suck. Just FYI.
SCHEDULE BREAKDOWN
In the Bag: Furman, Jacksonville State, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt
Mississippi State might appear to be an odd choice to include on South Carolina’s list of guaranteed wins, but I am expecting a significant regression for State this season. Sure, Will Rogers has been highly productive, but that was in Mike Leach’s air raid offense that he was a natural fit for. New Head Coach Zach Arnett has stated his intention to transition the Mississippi State offense to more of a pro-style attack, which is a style of offense that Rogers has no experience whatsoever running even dating back to high school. The Bulldogs will experience significant growing pains in year one of the Arnett era and a week four trip to Williams-Brice – an underrated home-field advantage – is too early to expect all of the kinks to be worked out.
No Chance In Hell: @ Georgia, @ Tennessee, Clemson
All three of these teams – albeit by varying degrees – are simply more talented than South Carolina. To overcome the talent gap in these games, the Gamecocks will need transcendent quarterback play, which I am not in the business of counting on with Spencer Rattler. Sure, he’s got it in him but that version of him only comes out about 10% of the time.
Yes. South Carolina did beat Tennessee and Clemson last year, but those were massive upsets and you don’t make a living betting on massive upsets. You play the odds. And the overwhelming odds are that a revenge-minded Tennessee team will smoke Carolina in Knoxville and Clemson will reassert its dominance in the series. Let’s not forget that prior to last season, Clemson had won 7-games in a row in the series for a reason; it’s just a better program, with better players.
So You’re Telling Me There’s a Chance!: North Carolina (Charlotte), Florida, @ Missouri, @ Texas A&M, Kentucky
So with 4 wins in the bag and 3 surefire losses, that means the Gamecocks have to win at least 3 of the 5 games in my toss-up tier to get to 7-wins and hit the over and that is going to be one hell of a uphill battle for the fighting Shane Beamers.
I’ve got UNC, @ Texas A&M, and Kentucky as likely losses, but the margins are still small enough to give Carolina a reasonable chance of winning them. UNC has a QB advantage on a neutral field, A&M is one of the five most talented teams in the country and Carolina has to go to College Station, and with Devin Leary at QB and Liam Coen back at OC Kentucky is my sleeper team in the SEC. Maybe the Cocks get one of those games, but I think it’s a stretch to believe they get two of them.
Florida and @ Missouri are more of the true toss-up variety. Fun fact: Shane Beamer has two upset wins over top-10 teams, but he has still never beaten Eli Drinkwitz and Missouri. And in 2023, Drinkwitz is poised to have his best squad since he’s been at Missouri. South Carolina could find a way to win both of these toss-up games, but with its inconsistencies at QB and overall roster deficiencies, it’s far more likely the Gamecocks split these two games.
This is far from my strongest win total play of the 2023 season, but I’ve got South Carolina reverting back to its 2021 form and going a clean 6-6. With what I believe to be 3 guaranteed losses on their schedule, the Gamecocks will need to go 3-2 in their toss-up games. It is not inconceivable that they could pull that off, hence this only being a 5 on my confidence meter, but I see 2-3 as being the far more likely outcome.
That’s a Wrap
South Carolina fans who have deluded themselves into thinking their top-10 wins over Tennessee and Clemson to end the 2022 season were the rule as opposed to the exception were bewildered when the win-totals were released and continue to scoff at the notion that their beloved Cocks are projected to straddle the line between 6 and 7-wins. But the oddsmakers, understanding that this is still a Gamecock program that was outgained by its opponents by over 300 yards last season, are unencumbered by emotional investment in the teams that they handicap and see South Carolina for what it is entering the 2023 season; a team that is capable of pulling an upset if the conditions are right, but a team that still lacks the high-end talent and depth on its roster to find a way to eek out seven wins against one of the 10 most difficult schedules in the country.
Bet the under and thank me later.