The South Carolina Gamecocks sure looked every bit an SEC East contender in their opener against the Golden Eagles of Southern Miss.
The defense played as well as expected. Aside from a meaningless touchdown with less than two minutes of game clock remaining, the Golden Eagles barely got a sniff of the end zone. In fact, the Golden Eagles only got inside the red zone twice and never took a snap inside the ten yard line.
But while the Gamecock defense was expected to be as stout as it showed, it was the offense that is sure to catch the eye of their compadres in the SEC East and of those that cast ballots in top 25 polls. Junior quarterback Stephen Garcia has been a lightning rod of criticism from pundits, fans and his own head coach, but he shined in the opener against Southern Miss.
If consistency is the knock against Garcia, he answered by completing 70% of his passes and showing the grit and determination of a quarterback necessary to turn South Carolina into a real contender. Those attributes can best be seen by the way he dismissed Southern Mississippi safety Justin Wilson with a hard shoulder bump before finishing off a 22 yard touchdown scramble for the first score of the game.
A pair of freshman, running back Marcus Lattimore and wide receiver Ace Sanders, looked like veterans against Southern Miss. Alshon Jeffrey, a sophomore wide receiver, looked exceptional. Even without tight end Weslye Saunders, the Gamecock offense was firing on all cylinders.
With the South Carolina defense as strong as expected and Stephen Garcia running an offense that looked to be both balanced and potent, the Gamecocks had every apperance of a team that could challenge Georgia and Florida for the SEC East.
But we’ve seen this before out of South Carolina, haven’t we?
The Gamecocks have a history under Steve Spurrier of coming out of the gates like gangbusters, whipping out wins like a real conference contender and harnessing that “dark horse” buzz into a conversation of “real deal.” But then the midpoint of the season hits and they fall apart. The ugly truth is that South Carolina has managed only one winning season in conference play since Steve Spurrier arrived in Columbia, his first year there in 2005.
It’s a nasty trend that I think deserves some notice.
2006 Season
In 2006, The Gamecocks started the season 5-2. Their hopes of contending in the SEC East were dashed with home losses to Tennessee and Arkansas. It took a home game against Middle-Tennessee State to get them out of that funk. Still, the Gamecocks lost three of their last five regular season games.
2007 Season
The 2007 season was a real enigma for South Carolina. After rattling off six wins in their first seven games, the Gamecocks followed it up by going winless in their last five games- a stretch started by a loss at home to Vanderbilt. Amidst the winless streak was a pair of back to back losses to Arkansas and Florida where the Hogs and Gators put up 99 points on the Gamecocks over that two game stretch.
2008 Season
The trend continued in 2008 as Spurrier’s squad started the season 5-2 in their first seven ballgames only to drop four of their last six, including their last three. Again, Florida dropped half a hundred on the Gamecocks for the second year in the row. The season ended on a particularly bad note, getting humiliated against Iowa in the Outback Bowl by the score of 31-10.
2009 Season
2009 looked as if it could be the year of the Gamecocks, and they would contend for the SEC East. They started a very respectable 6-2 with their only losses in Athens to the Bulldogs who were a top 25 team at the time and in Tuscaloosa to the eventual national champions. One of their wins was against then #4 Ole Miss and it truly looked like the Gamecocks had turned the corner. But reality started to set, in and it started against Vanderbilt. Although South Carolina defeated the Commodores, a 14-10 victory over Vanderbilt at home was not an impressive showing. Spurrier and the Gamecocks finished the year losing four of their last five, including another putrid performance in their bowl game against UConn.
The Outlook
Over the last four seasons, South Carolina has shown to be the real deal…for the first half of the season. Asking if South Carolina is a really good football team is easy to answer. Of course they are. We’re still in the first half. The better question is when will the wheels fall off? And if history is any indication, they certainly will, and you can expect them to fall off sooner rather than later.
If South Carolina beats Georgia in their next game, they could start the season with four straight wins. Furman will put up only token resistance, and Auburn still has a lot to prove, especially on defense. But soon after that is where the Gamecocks will get their true tests. They host Alabama and then travel to Lexington and then to Vanderbilt- and the Commodores have not been a surefire win for the Gamecocks lately. Three of their last four games are against Florida, Arkansas, and Clemson.
And seeing as how South Carolina is 1-3 in their last four bowl appearances, I wouldn’t be looking to end the season on a high note.
