Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] On this episode of Cox Talking Gamecocks, updates from the football team, including transfer portal and staffing. Men's basketball stumbles out of the gate for sec play. And women's basketball starts well. Okay, here we go, Sam.
[00:00:57] Okay.
[00:00:59] Welcome to episode 366 of Cox Talking Gamecocks. I am your host, Tim Cox, where I will keep every episode from 1801 to 2001. Happy New Year, Gamecocks. Welcome back, man. Yeah, it was a little bit of a holiday break there, so I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. Hope everyone had a Happy New Year and you were able to rest, recharge, re, energize, refocus, all that jazz. Alternatively, if you sat on the couch for the void of, you know, six, seven days between Christmas and going back to work in the new year, I don't blame you, because that void is.
[00:01:43] That void makes my year being able to just unapologetically eat everything I want, drink everything I want, taking minimal steps and just chilling. So, yes. Nonetheless, though, welcome back. And here we are, 2026. Pretty. Pretty remarkable. Pretty crazy. I know it's been a little while, but great to be back on the airwaves talking with y'. All. And, yeah, there's been a lot going on. I mean, outside of the Gamecocks, we got. You got the College Football Playoff, which I'll talk about a little bit. You have a lot going on in college basketball. You got NFL ramping up. If that's, you know, your thing. If you're a Panthers fan, congratulation.
[00:02:25] My goodness. But even outside of the games that were being played in Gamecock Nation, there is a lot to discuss about the football program, and I'm going to jump into this. A lot of this is going to be old news. I touched on some of this on my Instagram and, of course, have tweeted about things as well. But got to get on here and talk about it again. I know it's old news. I'm not trying to get ahead of anything here, but we got to talk about it. So first things first, let's talk about Transfer Portal, everyone's favorite subject here. I'm just going to run through some names of guys that stuck out to me for when we got the news that they transferred, I was like, dang, like, interesting air. Noland Tree Babalade. Miles Norwood. Rodney Newsome, Vandravius. That one was tough. Josiah Thompson. So there's a lot to unpack here. I mean, I think we've seen a lot of movement, particularly in the offensive line group. Where guys are transferring out, guys like Tree, Josiah, and on one hand, it's tough to see these highly recruited guys leave and guys that you had seen some progression for and you had hoped could take that next step with some good coaching.
[00:03:43] There's a lot of discourse online of you won four games last year.
[00:03:47] There's not a position group that wouldn't benefit from some new blood. And while I see that logic and follow it to a certain degree, you never want to have a lot of attrition that you have to worry about depth. We've seen what an offensive line group looks like when there isn't a lot of depth, if you got. If guys get injured. But what I think this is is a couple of things. You know, obviously the coach that recruited these guys isn't there, right? Whether that was Lonnie Teasley and then when he was working with Dowell or Shula, whoever, those guys aren't there. But they were also recruited for a certain system and they were evaluated for how they would be in that system. So I think Kendall Briles and coach Clem come in and they're not going to tell guys like, here's the door.
[00:04:42] I don't think that that's the type of program Shane Beamer is running, but they probably did have some conversations of, hey, this is what we expect in our offensive line. Something that's being talked about a lot is the tempo that Browse likes to work with. You have to be an agile, athletic, you know, runner, for lack of a better term, of an offensive lineman. It's a strain on those guys and there might be some other skill sets that are more nuanced that I'm not privy to that they look for. And the conversation may have gone like, hey, if this doesn't fit what you like to do, or you don't see yourself being able to do these things, like, yeah, you might benefit from a change of scenery there. So going to be very interesting to see how we backfill that position. I think the offensive line was going to be a priority anyway, but now it's a massive, massive priority. There other ones to touch on. Air Noland, that was interesting. I think he came to South Carolina with the idea of, if Lenores leaves, I'll be able to become QB1. Don't think that was promised, but probably in his head he thought, hey, Lenoris is scheduled to be a top pick. Lenores decides to come back to school and he's going to bounce. And then you look at Vandravius Jacobs, that was a Tough one. Fan favorite Gamecock Twitter fan favorite.
[00:06:07] That's a head scratcher that really is. I think that wide receiver group staying with Mike Furry under this Kendall Browse offense. There's a lot of potential for growth there.
[00:06:21] Vandravius was coming on strong pretty much all year, but especially in that back half of the year.
[00:06:26] So that's one where, who knows, that might be one where he might be chasing more of a bag and, you know, you got to get yours while you can, I guess, but that one stinks. That's going to be a tough replacement there. So I don't. I don't think there's a position group really outside of quarterback that South Carolina won't attack in the, in the portal. But nonetheless, there were some big departures, but there were equal big news drops for guys who are staying. Again, not breaking news here, but the Big Three are coming back and this is an incredible testament to Shane Beamer, Jeremiah Donati, Darren Earth, Shirley, everyone who touches this football program. The fact that we could retain Lenora Sellers, Dylan Stewart, and then also Nick harbor, who dropped that announcement on Christmas.
[00:07:17] The fact that you're bringing back these fantastic veteran players is a testament to the hard work that they're putting in the belief that they have in this program and coaching staff and everything else around this program. Because those are three incredibly important positions, especially when you talk about Dillon and Lenoris, where you need playmakers in those positions to make something happen. We saw how good Nick can be, especially last year, later in the year, and he's just gotten better year over year. And to have those guys coming back is a incredible foundation to lay down. You also had Matthew Fuller announce he's coming back. I think that's a fantastic decision. I think leaving would have been a little silly.
[00:08:04] You also have the entire linebacking corps coming back, at least the starters. You have Jo, Sean Murphy and Fred J.R. johnson. They all announced that they are coming back. So you have these veteran pieces at very important positions staying and more importantly, guys who are staying to have some continuity there. You know, you looked at 20, 24 and you see the importance that a veteran linebacking group made and you know, with, with Debo and Knight. But last year you did see that. You saw that missing at times, but when those guys played well together, it looked great. So now you're going to have those three guys who have played a lot of football together all coming back on the defensive side. Dylan Stewart is going to be there as, as the Stallworth. You have some veterans in the Defensive backfield. Again, I expect a lot of effort to bring in some depth in the defensive backfield, but I also expect a lot of work to be done on that defensive line as well. And you'll see what you can sprinkle in in the offensive skill positions, but of course along the offensive line. But I talked about the defensive line a second ago and then we have a lot to talk about there too because Sterling Lucas is no longer the defensive ends coach at South Carolina. He left for that same position at lsu.
[00:09:31] And if you watch the recent press conference, it seems like there was some questionable at best practices for how that was done. Shane Beamer basically said he got a call in one of the, you know, in the evening and by Sterling who said, hey, I'm thinking about taking this job at lsu. And by the morning it was done and there was no formal back and forth.
[00:10:03] Shane said that it's usually the best practice that you receive some sort of heads up from the other school's head coach that they're interested or they're going to start reaching out to this person, little professional courtesy. And he said that never happened.
[00:10:19] So very strange scenario here. First thing I thought of when this happened was that he's going to take Dylan Stewart with him. But Dylan decided to stay and again, a testament to him and to the rest of the staff for being able to do that. So Sterling Lucas, thanks for all you did, but see ya. Because we have brought in a very, very capable, some would say better exciting replacement from Penn State University, Deion Barnes. So Coach Barnes has coached guys like Abdul Carter and Chop Robinson. He is a big time rising star in the coaching arena and yeah, he's going to come in and coach these guys up. So a very, very welcomed bit of news there because we know how important Sterling Lucas was to the Gamecocks. There's no denying that he is a very good coach and he's a very good recruiter. I personally thought it was only a matter of time before he went to go on to become a defensive coordinator. So I thought it was weird for him to leave for basically the same position. But whatever, you know, I mean, we saw the work he did with Kyle Kennard, Brian Thomas, of course, Stewie. But Coach Barnes is coming in with an incredible track record of developing guys and I think that's part of the reason why Dylan decided to stay. But more importantly, Dylan, or excuse me, Dion Barnes has some really good connections with the guys he's already been recruiting to go to Penn State, a big time program, but also Guys who have been in the portal or are, you know, seemingly thinking about going into the portal from Penn State. And if you can leverage some of those connections to come to South Carolina. Well, now we're cooking. Because the question mark really going back to a lot of last season was who is going to play along Dylan Stewart in 2026, because we saw how deadly that combination can be. Yes, you have Julian Walker coming in as a freshman, but he's going to take time to develop. You got a couple guys on the roster who were coming back from injury, but I think you need someone more proven opposite there if you really want to wreak havoc. So going to be interesting to see what happens there. But, yes, Gamecock Football welcoming a new staff member in Deion Barnes. And hopefully that's the last of it, right? I mean, shoot.
[00:12:44] Freaking Lane Kiffin, man, just, you know, gets hired to lsu and just the ripple effects through college football is absolutely insane. I hate it. Like, you know, like, not gonna get into the whole thing about Lane, but annoyed with him, Annoyed with LSU as a program, like, whatever.
[00:13:04] Welcome home. Deion Barnes, a fantastic hire, and there's a really, really good foundation of players who are staying to move forward with this program. And there's a lot of potential to bring guys in who can be upgrades in a lot of positions across the board. Of course, some of these players will be missed. And it's funny when you win these recruiting battles and. And then you're excited that they're on campus and they're here for two years or whatever, and they look all right, you know, whatever, and then they leave, you know, it's. It's the modern. It's the modern game. It's the modern game. But all told, a lot of exciting updates from Gamecock Football. There were a lot of question marks going into the holidays with player retention and coaching and things like that, and a lot of those have been answered in a positive way. So give ourselves a pat on the back there. Take a big, deep breath, and all is well. But let's talk sports that are actually being played here. I'm talking basketball here.
[00:14:01] Teams were back in action, starting up SEC play, starting off well. The women played. The ladies opened up SEC play against Alabama, getting a nice, comfortable W83 57. But we'll circle back to the ladies in just a moment here. But. But on this past Tuesday. Excuse me, Saturday, my date's wrong. This past Saturday, men's basketball opened up SEC play at home against Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt, having a pretty solid year thus far, went into this one undefeated and it stayed that way as the guys dropped their SEC opener 83, 20 to 71.
[00:14:48] It was an interesting game. First half South Carolina was, you know, lagging behind but managed to close the gap to an eight point deficit at the half. You felt like, hey, if you can start off this second half well and slow down some of the hot hands that you saw Vanderbilt having that you might be able to hang around in this one. And unfortunately that is not what happened. Vanderbilt opened with with a pretty good run to open this lead up. South Carolina battle back.
[00:15:21] Kind of what we have seen through through throughout, throughout this year where there will be shifts where South Carolina can't get anything going and the guys are struggling to get stops, the other team gets hot and then in that little like that last third, if you will, of the half will make a little bit of a push, but it's just too little too late. There were some questionable defensive decisions, if you will, in this game. Lamont Paris seemingly a little too late, switching to the zone which ended up slowing down Vanderbilt. And then also with going to the press with just about a minute or so to go. But you know, there's a few ways to look at this game.
[00:16:08] Vanderbilt had some shots that just went in that you could throw your hands up and say that that's luck. They had a guy who was just on fire that game. There just was some things that you know, you kind of felt were out of your control. But the other side of this is, you know, real teams make their own luck, right? And it has felt that when faced with good competition, this South Carolina team is just not able to a get over the hump but just assert their will. Like I'm watching this, this game and there's multiple times where you have a clear shot at the basket and you don't pull the trigger or you're not able to finish or you have a silly turnover. And you know, at times it's maybe too many passes. At other times it's not being aggressive. At other times it's poor shot selection.
[00:16:56] They're just all over the place. There is no consistency with, with this team. And you know, when asked about some of those defensive decisions late in the game, Lamont Paris had a little bit of a sassy answer. And that's never a good sign.
[00:17:12] You know, when you see the stress and the pressure of underperforming leaking into the press conferences from your head coach and that's not really what you want to see at all from a head coach that's trying to battle through some adversity because that's the person who's supposed to live above all that nonsense. You know what I mean?
[00:17:32] And when you're asked about coaching decisions, like when you decided to press, you need to be able to answer those clearly and concisely, you know? And this team right now, you know, losing by 12 is just.
[00:17:48] It's just not looking good, you know, 9 to 5 on the year, 0 and 1. The SEC, it's was not the start this team was looking for. Elijah Strong leading the team with 17 points, Miles Studi with 14 and Mike with 13. And those are the only guys in double figures there.
[00:18:06] Michi Johnson, just shy that with nine points. He was the one who had a nice layup to bring that closer in the first half. But, yeah, these guys need to figure out a way to bring some more consistency to the table. Otherwise, this could be a long, long stretch here in the sec. The guys are back in action Tuesday night on the road at, funny enough, the aforementioned lsu. So we'll see if the guys can bounce back there. But the ladies were in action this weekend, taking on Florida Sunday afternoon ended up with the victory here, 74 to 63. But this game was close. Credit to Don Staley and this entire team for showing some grit, battling it out. There were some tough moments where the ladies had to dig deep and get some stops and find some offense, and that they did. I was very impressed with how this team played in the late second half, defensively especially, and then finding some good rebounds, distributing the ball and doing the right things to end up with the victory there. But yes, despite winning by 11 here, this game was pretty close at times. So a big testament to Don and the ladies for riding the wave here on the road.
[00:19:21] Mind you, to go 20 in the SEC.
[00:19:25] Player highlights here. Raven Johnson had a very nice game, 17 points. Tessa with 15 and a couple of. Both of these players actually had a couple of impressive late rebounds. Medina with a monster day, 12 points and 17 boards, and Joyce with 11 points and 10 boards as well. I felt that was a difference, especially late in the game. Just the rebounding ability for South Carolina, especially with Medina, she was just absolutely dominant late in the game, and that's what you want to see. You know, you have some of these athletes at South Carolina, you have to be able to flex it. It's, you know, sometimes the matchups don't work. I felt like against Florida, they were cooking that afternoon, and that was a big victory there that you love to see. The women are back in action Thursday evening against Arkansas on the road as well.
[00:20:16] And then just to put a bow on this here cfp, the College Football Playoff semifinals are this week.
[00:20:23] It's been a fun playoff. I mean, those quarterfinals there were, there were some, some good entertaining games here. My goodness, Indiana is something else. That Ole Miss game was, was rocking, too. And yeah, Texas Tech, seemingly one of the hotter teams. I was big on them throughout the season.
[00:20:40] Runs up against a brick wall. That is Oregon. So very, very interesting here. So I'm just doing winners. We're not going to get into the spreads and all that here. Give me Miami and Oregon. I've been on Oregon from the beginning.
[00:20:53] Indiana looks damn good, though. But I am going to rock the boat here a little bit. But with that, y', all, that wraps up this episode. Please follow me on social media, Twitter or X is Cox Gamecox.
[00:21:06] Instagram is just the name of the show. Cox Talking Gamecocks. And please, like, subscribe and review the podcast. I appreciate all y'. All. Go Cox.
