W
Wes Mitchell
Guest
** There's not much positive that can be taken from South Carolina's Belk Bowl performance and you'll get no spin from me on that. I still believe the overall trajectory of Will Muschamp's program is in the upward direction. From a big picture standpoint, there's still quite a bit to be excited about with the new state-of-the-art football ops building topping that list. But there are several aspects of the program that I believe Muschamp will look to continue to tweak as he goes through his annual post-season evaluation of every aspect of the organization from the top down.
** South Carolina's offensive scheme is still light years better than what it put on the field the previous two seasons, but I imagine the focus in the offseason will be to put a more consistent product on the field on that side of the ball from both a drive-to-drive and game-to-game standpoint.
As explosive as the offense has been at times - and Bryan McClendon does deserve credit for putting them in position to go make those big plays - the offense has relied on big plays almost too much and when they're not there, the ability to grind out drives and stay on the field hasn't been there to fall back on. It's still possible to be a "tempo-oriented" offense, as Carolina was this season, and stay on the field to protect your defense, but it seems with the focus on splash plays, that there's been a bit of a tradeoff that has led to more three-and-outs.
Combine that with the fact that even when the offense did hit the big, explosive plays, that led to quick scoring drives along with the defense's inability to get off the field, and that's why South Carolina had so many games with time of possession skewed against them. The lack of depth certainly hurt the defense in the first place and it was only exacerbated by the time of possession difference.
The Virginia game was a microcosm of the entire season on the offensive side of the ball as there were explosives here and there but the offense was unable to stay on the field with four three-and-outs and a fifth drive of just four plays. The Virginia defense deserves some credit as that was a solid unit all season long (their defensive backs are what I think you envision South Carolina's ultimately being under Muschamp - big, fast, physical, great ball skills) and they play a unique scheme that forces the quarterback to put the ball in tight windows. Early on, I felt like Carolina's offensive line protected Jake Bentley well as the Cavs were just rushing three and four, but once they started bringing extra rushers and having success with it, the Gamecocks were never able to force them into anything different.
As much as I usually applaud aggressive playcalling, the play-action pass on 4th and inches early in the game when a simple quarterback sneak would probably have worked set the tone of the entire game. Sure, the playcall was there, but when you make that call on a 4th down, you invite the possibility of a dropped pass to a running back that has struggled with that part of his game. If it was 4th and a full yard, maybe, but I didn't like the call at all with inches to go.
As bad as the South Carolina running game was on this day, they still probably abandoned it a little too soon. Carolina had just 25 offensive plays in the second half of the game by my count and there were only two designed runs. That number seems almost unbelievable to me but I have checked it twice and believe it to be correct.
Carolina will have to continue to look at its running game in the offseason and like many of the issues, the first way to correct it is with better recruiting. We've mentioned this a few times this season, but when I look at the truly great offenses that are out there in college football today, they all have great-to-elite running backs and many of them have multiple backs that fit that description.
Having a back who can get the extra yardage, make something out of nothing, and turn 10-yard runs into long runs, can be the difference in what I'm talking about above - staying on the field vs. going three and out when the explosive plays aren't hitting. Having a big-time rushing attack, gives you the luxury of taking chances on deep shot plays on first downs when you know you can lean on the running game to get back to a 3rd and short if the first down play doesn't hit. That's why, in my opinion, Carolina's offense has looked unstoppable against the teams it could run the ball against and has been all or nothing against the teams it can't.
Looking ahead to the 2020 class, it's imperative that Carolina brings in an elite-type running back and as we've mentioned, Hogansville (Ga.) Callaway four-star Tank Bigsby and Rockledge (Fla.) three-star Ladarius Tennison (that ranking will almost surely go up - he's a big-time player) are the two to watch for South Carolina early on.
South Carolina's wide receiver group without Deebo Samuel also has its share of question marks and the staff will need to continue to add playmakers there. Bryan Edwards and Shi Smith are proven players, but the unit as a whole reverted back to some of its issues from earlier in the season in this game. Smith is the type of gamebreaker you need for sure, but in watching the teams in the College Football Playoffs, the great teams have multiple receivers with that ability.
I was somewhat surprised that Josh Vann has had a few issues holding onto the ball this year as he was one of the most sure-handed prospects we saw in camp all last year and the ball generally sticks to his hands with ease. He's still someone that can be very good for this offense and will need a great offseason going into his sophomore year, because he'll be counted on next year in the rotation.
** On the defensive side of the ball, it's hard to truly evaluate the unit as a whole with no games this season that the entire unit was healthy and on the field. I wouldn't call it a pretty performance versus Virginia by any means, but it was sort of what you expected going in when considering how many guys were out and how that unit has looked in the second half of the season.
Virginia was faster than I expected coming into the game and that speed seemed to give Carolina fits as it created bad angles and tackling. The 8-plus minute, 90-yard drive was certainly a killer, but the defense needed something from the offense in order to win the game, but that obviously never came.
Were most of South Carolina's injuries a result of pure bad luck? I don't have the answers there, but I believe you'll see Muschamp take a deep look into that question this offseason and evaluate if there's anything that can be done to limit more of those issues. With the returning players and incoming players on the defensive line and in the secondary, there's reason for optimism for the future of this unit moving forward.
** Getting back to my very first point, I don't think anyone should be happy with the result of Saturday's game. South Carolina was outplayed by Virginia in about every way and many of the issues that have affected the Gamecocks all season long were exposed again by the Cavaliers. Again, the simple answer is that Carolina will have to continue to recruit and bring in the right players to compete at a higher level. Muschamp has made several big changes already in his time in Columbia and I believe you'll see further tweaks moving forward this offseason to try and rectify the issues that consistently plagued the program this season.
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