Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] On this episode of Cox Talking Gamecocks, an absolute must win for the football team. Men's soccer gets a W, and I give my six pack of picks. Okay, here we go.
[00:00:54] Okay.
[00:00:56] Welcome to episode three, 342 of Cox Talking Gamecocks. I am your host, Tim Cox, where I will keep every episode from 1801 to 2001. Hope y' all had a great week out there. Gamecock Nation.
[00:01:13] I trust that we, in a sad way, have gotten through our.
[00:01:18] Our process, our stages of grief, if you will. It sucks to have that muscle memory when you have two losses in a row, but here we are, sitting at the end of another week, ready to sit down and put ourselves through the emotional roller coaster that is Gamecock football and Gamecock athletics overall. But, yes, I do trust that y' all had a lovely week. I am off to a wedding this weekend, but shout out to the good sense of these people to at least have the dignity to have a fall wedding on a Friday.
[00:01:52] If it was Saturday, we would have had a big issue, and I would have been the guy with, you know, the phone out, just watching the game. But, hey, don't have to. Don't have to worry about that. I've. I've been that guy. I got. There's no shame in being that guy. But good friends of ours want to at least try and, you know, be present for shout or something like that. But nonetheless, crisis averted here. Got only a 1 score to update y' all on before I jump into the rest of football news and everything like that. So this score comes out of Tuesday.
[00:02:27] Men's soccer beat Queens University 1, nothing big win there. Shout out to men's soccer. Seems like they're having a little bit of a good season, trending in the right direction. You know, they've had a tough loss here and there, but generally speaking, I think they are moving in the right direction there. But have a couple of bits of news for y' all related to the football team before I dive into Saturday here.
[00:02:53] The big news conference, wide news, mind you. Something we don't always get to talk about a lot here, but this was.
[00:03:02] They, like, teased this out in, like, the smallest little courses possible of information. Like, okay, SEC is going to nine games. The SEC will have. You'll have three permanent opponents, and then a rotating. And then they had an announcement with. For the announcement that it was going to come out on Tuesday, and then the story was broke early. So we have officially found out who the permanent opponents for really moving forward are for South Carolina and then you'll have the three opponents permanently and then you'll rotate the remaining six around the league basically to fill out nine conference games. So for South Carolina, the three PERMA opponents are uga, Florida and Kentucky.
[00:03:55] Welcome back SEC east, baby. Long time no see. It's like saying hello to a good friend. Yeah, I mean it is pretty cool to see like yes, there are folks who could say I, you know, you kind of wish you had Vandy. Well, I don't know if you want that anymore or like, oh, you got this school got off lucky. But look, you just look at what was given to us.
[00:04:18] I think I speak for a lot of people where it has been weird not playing these teams every year. The Georgias, the Florida's, the Tennessee's of the world.
[00:04:29] So to bring back the Georgia game, which means a lot to South Carolina fans, Border War and all that, you get that game back. And sure they have been historically very, very good at football. But that game has provided some great moments for us as fans, Florida and another SEC east opponent. And if you're looking short term, you know they've had their ups and downs really in the last 10, 10 years, really 15ish. Right. Like they've been pretty inconsistent of a program. So sure, if you want to look at potential ease, there's that. But I think that's always a fun matchup too. And then Kentucky, where that's a matchup that goes back quite some time. And if you are looking for a little bit of competitive balance, historically speaking, that's where you'll have it. But you know, every year this is gonna get balanced, you know, one way or the other. Right. Like you'll have years where those programs are excellent but maybe your rotating opponents are a little weaker or vice versa and things like that. But with this, the SEC announced the home and away opponents for like the next three years. It's insane.
[00:05:44] So I, I was looking at 2028 and I'm like, man, like that'd be a fun trip to make. I'm like, I don't even know where the hell I'll be living in 2028. It's. It's crazy.
[00:05:54] So next year focusing on that, at least the opponents workout where we have home games against Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Tennessee and Texas A and M. So again you're seeing some of that rotating already where it's been a few years since we've played Mississippi State. You get back that Tennessee game and for some godforsaken reason A and M sticks around road games next year against Alabama, Arkansas, Florida and Oklahoma. So some things to look forward to. If you have a few minutes to spare, go to the the football team's page and they have it all laid out for the home and away games for the next few years. And it is fun to be like, oh, maybe in two years I'll take a trip to Austin. So it's cool to see and I mean it's kind of interesting. You know, you look at Bama and Oklahoma really here where we will now have played each other at this point three years in a row next year. So that's kind of cool, you know, trying to, you're building up a little bit of history, you know, a little bit of a back and forth with some teams that previously that you really didn't.
[00:07:07] But anyway, back to this year for better or worse, Injury news. So because of this previously mentioned wedding, I'm recording this earlier than I normally do.
[00:07:20] So I don't have an injury injury report yet. But the big news from where I'm sitting here today a little bit earlier in the week is that Judge Collier is working his way back and it seems like he may seem the field see the field in a little bit of limited action Saturday night. But that is a welcomed welcome bit of news, even if he only gets, you know, call it 10 snaps or something like that. And he feels good to be getting him back for the gauntlet that lies after the bye week is huge and that'd be a big boost for everything.
[00:07:59] But there is a task at hand here and that is this Saturday night.
[00:08:07] 7:45 South Carolina taking on Kentucky, our new permanent rival in Williams Bryce. Carolina currently sitting at a six and a half point favorite, looking to get back in the win column.
[00:08:22] And I'm just going to jump off the top rope with this.
[00:08:25] I think that this is the most must win game of Shane Beamer's tenure at South Carolina.
[00:08:35] Notice how I phrase that. I didn't say this is the biggest game. I said that this is the most must win game. Okay.
[00:08:44] Biggest game. We can, we can debate that maybe last year's Clemson game. Some of these A and M games there have been a big moment Kentucky games for him as well. It's funny how Kentucky finds its way into these spots.
[00:08:59] But right now you're South Carolina. You're sitting at 2 and 2. You're coming to terms with that. Hey, this is a different year than maybe some of us expected.
[00:09:09] You're on a two game slide and you're staring at your bye week next week, and then you're staring down the barrel of a cannon for basically the month of October into November.
[00:09:21] So this game is absolutely critical to get that winning feeling back, because if you can get some momentum back on your side, C1, go through the hoop, so to speak, get an SEC win, get a big home win, right? Like have that classic Willie B. Night game, they said it's a sellout night game, Willie B. SEC opponent, just go get the W and then you can take that momentum and everything you did right into the bi week, double down on it, and then you can work on the things that you will surely still need to work on in the bi week.
[00:10:04] Because to go into the BI week at 3 and 2, you can then start to see like, okay, here are the paths that we have in this season.
[00:10:14] If things don't go the right way on Saturday, I don't blame anyone for doing anything.
[00:10:22] You can put up the biggest red flag you'd like at your house. You can break the panic bucket, panic button. You can say, Shane Beamer's on the hot seat if this goes south on Saturday night, I really wouldn't blame anybody.
[00:10:38] Because when you look at the talent of this team compared to some of these expectations, compared to how they've looked, these first now four games, all of which were winnable. And so to have be on the wrong side of two of them, you got whacked alongside the head in one of them at home, and you had a late game sort of unraveling a bit in another, right? You were leading.
[00:11:11] All of a sudden this thing could go sideways in a hurry. And so you have to absolutely put a stop to that.
[00:11:20] We've seen bits and pieces, you know, like, I. I saw some of the highlights from the Missouri game, you know, some of the deep shots that worked, you know, and then just other. Just, you know, good offensive plays and whatnot. And, you know, rewatching, like, okay, like, there was a little bit of a semblance of rhythm here for a little bit.
[00:11:42] And you saw some plays that people had been asking for, like Lenoris on the move, you know, and in that. And hitting that intermediate throw, it's just consistency, you know, and that's what I've been thinking about a lot this week with this team last year.
[00:12:01] And I know I've. I lament when I do this, but last year, right out of the gate, you had phenomenal defense.
[00:12:08] And you could point to like two or three things as to why the team at that bye week wasn't undefeated, frankly.
[00:12:19] And you could Say, well, Lenoris is inexperienced, there's turnover problems, and then, you know, you could throw the O line in there as well.
[00:12:27] A lot of those were fixable to a degree, like, okay, cut down on the turnovers and Lenoris will get experience. So those are two big deals right there. And the O line sort of is what it is. But they tinkered with some, you know, where guys were and they did marginally improve the end of last year.
[00:12:46] This year, to me, it's just a wide array of issues, right. And I'm going to get into some of this year in my crows to the game. But defensively now all of a sudden we're talking about tackling where we hadn't talked about that through three games. So that's a new problem.
[00:13:04] Penalties are a problem.
[00:13:06] You know, you are have, you have Lenores taking bad sacks.
[00:13:11] You know, you see him having a little bit of inconsistency in the throwing game.
[00:13:15] This team has no semblance of a run game.
[00:13:19] And because of that, you have no run blocking, you have no pass blocking, you know, so there's a litany of issues. It's not just these couple of things that they did game over game that you're like, okay, they just need to fix that thing and it can be okay. It's like, okay, well, there's a few things that we're worried about here and then you can sprinkle on the top of it a lot of folks being unhappy with the play calling and the formations and the scheme and all that jazz.
[00:13:49] So all of that to say I digress is that you have an opportunity to come home as a touchdown favorite against the team that, you know, you've been able to be on the right side of this thing lately. Sort of right at the ship in that rivalry. A team that is going to play hard, but, you know, call spade a spade. They're not highly ranked right now. I don't think they're expected to be. So get that winning feeling back, go into the bye week with a winning record and then take that time to really get to work on some of these things. And I think now through four games and Shane Beamer, this was kind of the most clear I've heard him say it in his press conference. Said, you know, he talked to the coaches, he's like, you know, we have a four game body of work here. It's not just one game. We can react this way and whatnot. So what are my crows to the game here? Okay, Kentucky sitting at 2 and 1. This is their first real road game of the year. Again, South Carolina has been on the right side of this a couple times in a row. Now overall for the team, you have to cut out the penalties, okay? Far too many penalties. Putting us behind the sticks, putting us off schedule, giving those extra chances to the opponent, cut out the penalties.
[00:15:17] Defensively, my first crow to the game, improve the tackling, okay? I touched on that a second ago at the end of the Missouri game. That's what killed us. You saw sloppy tackling and you're talking about a Kentucky team that is so far leaning on their run game.
[00:15:35] And it's always a physical team that plays you hard and wants to win the line of scrimmage. So if these guys are getting to that second level of defense, you need to be able to not allow them to break a big one, especially late in the game. Clayton White talked a lot about this, Shane Beamer talked a lot about this. That they emphasized it this week in practice.
[00:15:57] And you know, typically speaking, they have been a pretty good tackling defense, but you can't let those things happen, especially late in the game.
[00:16:09] Second crow for the defense win the fourth quarter. You could say this for the whole team, right? But we've seen in two back to back games now where the defense has been probably just gassed and come the fourth quarter they give up a score or two and it's been the difference, especially when you look at that Missouri game. So win the fourth quarter and third crow get off the field on third down. I've said this before, the third down defense has been killing us and it's part of the reason why these guys are gassed in the fourth is because they just can't get off the field.
[00:16:45] So I don't know what that means. Like I'm, I'm not in the meeting rooms, I have a podcast, right? Like you have to find the tendencies and you have to find what works for you and maybe change it up a little bit on those third downs to find a way to get off the field.
[00:17:09] Now, offensively, my first crow to the game here is keep attacking over the top somehow some way like the deep shot, even that play action for explosive, that, that's been a weapon so far. It's gone pretty well.
[00:17:27] So it's a small bright spot on this offense. And so I say let's just double down on it. You know, from what I've read and seen, Kentucky likes to play soft on these guys. So let harbor or Vandravius get a full head of steam and just attack over the top get those big explosive plays. Shane Beamer even was kidding around a little bit when asked about how that has been a bright spot. You know, he was saying, you know, you always hear the adage, you run to set up the pass. He was like, maybe we throw to set up the run. And it's like, honestly, whatever works, dude.
[00:18:02] And so that ties into my second Crow here. Lenores needs to stay upright.
[00:18:07] I don't care who you put that on, you can say that that's on the offensive line. They have to simply pass block better. I agree with you. But again, through four games, I don't have faith that we're just going to one game that's going to look great.
[00:18:22] So that bubbles down to Lenores understanding when he needs to throw it away, when he needs to step up in the pocket and just scramble for even if just a yard. But some of those sacks that we saw last Saturday absolutely cannot happen.
[00:18:40] Third Crow, and this might be a staple here, find production from the running backs. Lenores is not getting any help in that department.
[00:18:49] I don't care if it's Matt Fuller, Jaron Howell, Sewell, Oscar, somebody has to be able to get something going, okay, like, and if you have to just run to the outside and run, you know, counters and things like that, stretch plays, do it.
[00:19:05] You just have to think outside the box and get these guys going.
[00:19:11] So overall for the game, you know, I feel like I've said a lot about it already.
[00:19:16] It's as big of a must win as you get, in my opinion, for the team's morale, for their confidence, for Shane Beamer, for the fans, you name it.
[00:19:28] Anyone associated with South Carolina football needs to see a W Saturday night.
[00:19:34] And the thing is like, you know, we have the team to do it. We have the Jimmy's and the Joes to get this done.
[00:19:43] This is a game against Kentucky that, you know it's going to be a physical smash mouth type of game.
[00:19:52] They're a team that doesn't hurt themselves a lot. They're a team that understands what they have to do.
[00:20:00] This game tends to be low scoring, so don't freak out, you know, about the offense too much. You know, there's some is warranted for sure, but points are going to be at a premium. I suspect that this game.
[00:20:13] But lean on what has worked. Just keep doubling down on what has worked. Put the ball into your skill position players hands, get it going. And if Linoris has that lane, he's got to take it.
[00:20:29] Great opportunity for a W. Get the momentum back. Let's go night game. Will he be alright? Let me give y' all my six pack of picks and then I will get y' all out of here real quick here. ACC I'm going Georgia Tech minus 13 and a half verse Wake Forest Big 12 Cincinnati versus Kansas going over 55 and a half Big 10 Oregon plus 3 and a half versus Penn State LSU or excuse me the SEC. Got a pair of overs for you here. LSU versus Ole Miss over 55 and a half UMass versus Missouri over 56 and a half and then group of five I'm going Georgia Southern versus JMU 57 and a half. A lot of totals this week. Let's see how it goes. But with that y' all that wraps up this episode.
[00:21:19] Please follow me on social media Twitter or X is Cox Gamecox. Instagram is just the name of the show Cox Talking Gamecox and please like subscribe and review the podcast. I appreciate all y' all Go Cox.
