I have thought about this game for 24 hours, and I think I know why the loss bothers us all so much. I also think this is exactly why we lost the game in the first place.
Basically I want to apologize to this team to tell them I’m sorry, because I believe we are all partly to blame for this loss, and (possibly the loss to Virginia).
You see, we play in the greatest conference in all the land. The SEC! And I was not afraid to tell anyone who will listen that their conference is second rate. Last year I made it a point to tell accers that the gamecocks would win the coastal without a doubt, and would probably finish second in the Atlantic, first if we switched schedules with Clemson. I would venture to guess that the majority of our fans felt this way before yesterday, and before the uva game.
The problem is that although we may have the superior atheletes, I think we have negatively affected our team by building them up to the point that they believe the SEC patch on their jersey makes them into superheros. they believe they don’t have to work as hard to win because the conference slate sharpens them (iron sharpens iron etc...). We say this to them and ourselves over and over again every week. The team I saw at BOA on Saturday thought It could just show up and it would win that game. You could see it on everyone’s faces. Its why we were all stunned (including Todd Ellis, tommy Suggs, all of our insiders, we all felt like we were punched in the face yesterday). This after we were guaranteeing a win in this one and telling g at Kirk Herbstreit calling him a Clemson homer fraud after he picked unc.
We as FANS also thought we could just show up and win! I was the first to put down ACC football anytime a conversation got started. My unc and clemson friends didn’t really know how to respond to me, but I could usually shut them up when I talked about our conference affiliation. this type of thinking left me/ us unprepared for a dog fight which is what we got. And is why we lost. We had it stuck in our mind that the ACC was dog crap. We told our sec friends that the ACC was trash. We had everyone believing that Clemson played no one on their way to the CFPs. We thought unc was dookie.
This one hurts us all, because we have made a living telling fans from the upstate school their conference is inferior and trash. Calling them Clemson and the 13 dwarfs. Telling the baby blue folks that they didn’t stand a chance against the big bad sec. telling anyone who would listen that they need to put on their big boy pants to win this one, when the truth is, “we have been the team that has been wearing the panties all along”!
I’m angry that I completely lost bragging rights against the ACC in a span of three games.
If we as fans thought we were the greatest show and conference on earth, I can guarantee you our players and recruits thought/ think the same thing, and showed up to the game entitled. With the belief this was going to be easy, it was no wonder we get booty blasted, and are now realizing the fallacy of this belief.
I’ll never forget the year we got killed by Clemson BAW said it wouldn’t, couldn’t ever happen again because we are an SEC school. Almost like it was a fluke. He truly thought it was a fluke because he was an sec player. Then we got choke slammed 3 more times afterwards with no end in sight.
I see this entitlement now first hand and I recognize we are a major part of this problem.
I am openly apologizing to our team for giving them this false sense of security. You see playing in the SEC does not automatically make us some juggernaught, we are no different than the other 120 teams in College football. Yes we happen to have a few more teams in the sec west that can compete as compared to other conferences, but that doesn’t make us special at all.
I will no longer be chanting SEC when we play or happen to beat a nonconference foe. I will no longer tell anyone that a mediocre/ middle of the pack sec team could win another power 5 conference, (and after Tennessee’s performance I’m not sure our middle and lower sec teams could win the sunbelt). I will be telling anyone who will listen, that their conference is probably better than the sec east. I will tell them that we have not contributed much to our conferences success. Yes the sec West is a strong division, but when Clemson is playing Alabama, Auburn, LSU and Texas aTm as much as we are, does it really give us any real leverage to say that those games are our main impedance to winning games?
You see we cheer for South Carolina, and just because we belong to a conference that is pretty good most years, it does not make us destined for any additional success. We have been a .500 team for over 100 years. We have been a doormat for over 100 years. We are fooling ourselves if we really think our recruits are all superior to UVA, BC, UNC, Pitt, NC state, FSU, Syracuse, or any other middling big 12 pac 12 or big 10 school (well we’re probably better than the mid big 10 schools because they really stink), but you get my point.
If our players want to win games they are going to have to do what other programs have to do to win. They will have to work for it. These guys have been fed so much bs from us that it’s impossible for them to stay humbled, and grounded, and for that we are all partly to blame.
From this day forward, I no longer care how the rest of the conference does. They can lose all the nonconference games or win them. Doesn’t matter to me, because it doesn’t affect us. In fact I think it just gives us an overblown ego. I may even start cheering for OOC teams to start beating the sec juggernaughts. The gamecocks might be better off if our sec brethren stunk for about 30 years. At least our misery would have some company.
The main problem I see is that this cycle will never change, all it will take is a few big wins and we will he back to doing the things that are detrimental to our success. Other than changing myself, I am not sure how else to fix this, but step one is identifying one of the major problems.
Basically I want to apologize to this team to tell them I’m sorry, because I believe we are all partly to blame for this loss, and (possibly the loss to Virginia).
You see, we play in the greatest conference in all the land. The SEC! And I was not afraid to tell anyone who will listen that their conference is second rate. Last year I made it a point to tell accers that the gamecocks would win the coastal without a doubt, and would probably finish second in the Atlantic, first if we switched schedules with Clemson. I would venture to guess that the majority of our fans felt this way before yesterday, and before the uva game.
The problem is that although we may have the superior atheletes, I think we have negatively affected our team by building them up to the point that they believe the SEC patch on their jersey makes them into superheros. they believe they don’t have to work as hard to win because the conference slate sharpens them (iron sharpens iron etc...). We say this to them and ourselves over and over again every week. The team I saw at BOA on Saturday thought It could just show up and it would win that game. You could see it on everyone’s faces. Its why we were all stunned (including Todd Ellis, tommy Suggs, all of our insiders, we all felt like we were punched in the face yesterday). This after we were guaranteeing a win in this one and telling g at Kirk Herbstreit calling him a Clemson homer fraud after he picked unc.
We as FANS also thought we could just show up and win! I was the first to put down ACC football anytime a conversation got started. My unc and clemson friends didn’t really know how to respond to me, but I could usually shut them up when I talked about our conference affiliation. this type of thinking left me/ us unprepared for a dog fight which is what we got. And is why we lost. We had it stuck in our mind that the ACC was dog crap. We told our sec friends that the ACC was trash. We had everyone believing that Clemson played no one on their way to the CFPs. We thought unc was dookie.
This one hurts us all, because we have made a living telling fans from the upstate school their conference is inferior and trash. Calling them Clemson and the 13 dwarfs. Telling the baby blue folks that they didn’t stand a chance against the big bad sec. telling anyone who would listen that they need to put on their big boy pants to win this one, when the truth is, “we have been the team that has been wearing the panties all along”!
I’m angry that I completely lost bragging rights against the ACC in a span of three games.
If we as fans thought we were the greatest show and conference on earth, I can guarantee you our players and recruits thought/ think the same thing, and showed up to the game entitled. With the belief this was going to be easy, it was no wonder we get booty blasted, and are now realizing the fallacy of this belief.
I’ll never forget the year we got killed by Clemson BAW said it wouldn’t, couldn’t ever happen again because we are an SEC school. Almost like it was a fluke. He truly thought it was a fluke because he was an sec player. Then we got choke slammed 3 more times afterwards with no end in sight.
I see this entitlement now first hand and I recognize we are a major part of this problem.
I am openly apologizing to our team for giving them this false sense of security. You see playing in the SEC does not automatically make us some juggernaught, we are no different than the other 120 teams in College football. Yes we happen to have a few more teams in the sec west that can compete as compared to other conferences, but that doesn’t make us special at all.
I will no longer be chanting SEC when we play or happen to beat a nonconference foe. I will no longer tell anyone that a mediocre/ middle of the pack sec team could win another power 5 conference, (and after Tennessee’s performance I’m not sure our middle and lower sec teams could win the sunbelt). I will be telling anyone who will listen, that their conference is probably better than the sec east. I will tell them that we have not contributed much to our conferences success. Yes the sec West is a strong division, but when Clemson is playing Alabama, Auburn, LSU and Texas aTm as much as we are, does it really give us any real leverage to say that those games are our main impedance to winning games?
You see we cheer for South Carolina, and just because we belong to a conference that is pretty good most years, it does not make us destined for any additional success. We have been a .500 team for over 100 years. We have been a doormat for over 100 years. We are fooling ourselves if we really think our recruits are all superior to UVA, BC, UNC, Pitt, NC state, FSU, Syracuse, or any other middling big 12 pac 12 or big 10 school (well we’re probably better than the mid big 10 schools because they really stink), but you get my point.
If our players want to win games they are going to have to do what other programs have to do to win. They will have to work for it. These guys have been fed so much bs from us that it’s impossible for them to stay humbled, and grounded, and for that we are all partly to blame.
From this day forward, I no longer care how the rest of the conference does. They can lose all the nonconference games or win them. Doesn’t matter to me, because it doesn’t affect us. In fact I think it just gives us an overblown ego. I may even start cheering for OOC teams to start beating the sec juggernaughts. The gamecocks might be better off if our sec brethren stunk for about 30 years. At least our misery would have some company.
The main problem I see is that this cycle will never change, all it will take is a few big wins and we will he back to doing the things that are detrimental to our success. Other than changing myself, I am not sure how else to fix this, but step one is identifying one of the major problems.
