Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] On this episode of Cox Talking Gamecock's recap and reaction to the football team beating Texas A and M. Okay, here we go.
[00:00:51] Okay.
[00:00:53] Welcome to episode 420 of Cox Talking Gamecocks. I am your host, Tim Cox, where I will keep every episode from 1801 to 2001. And we're just jumping right in here because, wow.
[00:01:08] I mean, that's all there is to say about what we witnessed Saturday afternoon into Saturday evening. And it's just, wow. It's the type of moment and game that you just have to sit back and you throw your hands up, and that's. That's a moment right there. And it's crazy because we've had, what, two or three of these just this year alone, where it's the type of game and plays that you'll talk about for a long, long time. And it's Lenoris, right? It's LA Legacy. It's LA Hero. And, you know, for the football team to be on this heater that they are right now, it, again, it just speaks to the resolve of this group and the grit and the fight. I mean, that game, the word is gritty. Like, there's a lot of definitions of grit. PMT does an entire week annually dedicated to finding out what grit means to different football guys.
[00:02:20] And that's the perfect example of what it means where things are not going your way. You are up against the wall. It's an uphill battle. Your game plan is different.
[00:02:33] What do you do? How do you respond? And you fight, claw, and scratch your way to a victory in a game that really did not go according to plan whatsoever, and you end up on the right side of it, and you keep this thing going on a Saturday that had so much buildup around college football, and there were some very good games, and there was a little bit of chaos around the college football world, and, you know, you can't really get too caught up in that. I mean, I certainly was, like. I was, like, really, really, like, rooting for some of these results to go our way. Way our way. Like, way like Missouri taxes.
[00:03:13] But really, the only thing that matters for the next couple of weeks is just do us and win and let the chips fall where they may. And there's no use in looking backwards. Just look forwards. And that's exactly what this team has been doing, and it really is remarkable. So, yeah, let's. It's like, where do you begin with this game? And I'm gonna begin from the beginning, of course.
[00:03:38] South Carolina getting the huge win over Texas A&M, 17 to 9. And it's funny because the game started and Kendall Briles was clearly going to. Was clearly trying to be aggressive. Like the very first play of the game is that deep shot. And the first two drives, I believe it was, had those shot plays called. And it was different than what we've seen from South Carolina, which is fine. And I think that's by design. I think he was trying to probe a little bit to see what we could do.
[00:04:10] And you almost hit on a couple of them.
[00:04:13] But it's also, I think, because the loss of Matt Fuller and we saw that on display in this game where A and M was keyed in on Lenoris early and wasn't giving him a lot of space.
[00:04:26] Coleman didn't have a ton of space early on, so Briles was going to take the shot. And it was kind of challenging to watch at first because you're like, what the heck is going on here?
[00:04:36] And then in that scoring drive towards the.
[00:04:43] Towards the end of the first quarter there, or excuse me, it was in the second quarter, but you saw perfect balance where you did get the run game going a little bit, and it opened up the pass and it was great tempo, beautiful execution. Everyone on the same page. You had A and M on their heels. And that's when to me, it felt like, okay, we're going to really get this thing going here where you tried to mess with them a little bit and then you get that score on them. And then in my mind, it was like A and M is going to regress back to the mean of what we've seen.
[00:05:18] And it was trending that way. But then you have the injury, it really was trending where, you know, you're right there deep in the red zone, you're fixing to score some points, you're going to go up a couple of possessions going into half. And it felt like, okay, we're gonna cruise this now.
[00:05:36] And that's when everything changed.
[00:05:40] And I. I'll tell you one thing, I freaking hate Texas A M. That team is freaking. Every time we play them, I swear to God, something weird happens. Like, they're a haunted team. It's probably their cult fan base, like praying to some weird Reveley God deity that just something funky happens whenever you play them. And so Lenoris goes down and in my head it was like, okay, this is about to go sideways.
[00:06:12] And it was. I had. I had every thought in my head was. Was running through it and it was, all right, that was. That was fun. Three game Win streak. This is, this is going to be an uphill battle. Who knows, right? I immediately had flashbacks to that haunted LSU game where you're, you're really starting to get this thing rolling. Norris goes down, the game goes down a drain. But you know, he had plenty of time to go into the locker room. You know, it was before the half. Then you had the halftime A and M, got that, got the possession and Lenores comes out and like that's what sports is all about.
[00:06:54] And in today's day and age, in college football particularly, there's a lot of me, there's a lot of I.
[00:07:01] And what makes college football so special and what has made it great for us for all these years is that the guys have tended to play for the name on the front of the jersey and the nil and the transfer portal has changed some of that.
[00:07:20] What we saw with Lenores giving it a go, right? Like he said, I can play on this.
[00:07:27] The team needs me. I'm the leader. I have to lead by example. That's a tough MF right there.
[00:07:35] And he did it for the name on the front.
[00:07:38] And it wasn't pretty. It wasn't.
[00:07:43] But you do just enough and you put your team in a position to win.
[00:07:50] You get that field goal. Orson, who made up for the miss earlier, gets the field goal. We go up in the fourth and the rest is what we saw. And I'll get to the defense in a second here. But when you get the ball and Lenores has that opportunity to take to the house and he does on the one leg, like that is a freaking warrior. Like that's the, that, that's the, the term that was on the Instagram caption. I was saying it with the, with my buddies that I was watching it with. I had everyone texting me and that word kept coming up organically is warrior.
[00:08:32] Because he put his head down, he went to work, put the team on his back, and on one leg hobbled into the end zone with an image that will live in all of Gamecock fans minds forever.
[00:08:48] And you put the game on ice. Like, you know, it was, it was a deal where you're kind of saying like, oh, like go down, go down. He said it, Lenore said it. And then I actually think was truly like, I don't think he could have really gone down like gracefully, right? Like, I think his ankle was hurting, that he had to stay on his feet. He had a full head of steam. He couldn't stop on a dime. But you play to win the game.
[00:09:09] Your Defense was playing really well up until that point. You let up nine points, you play to win the game, you know, and I saw someone put out there on social media is, you know, you cut off the head of the proverbial snake. Just you can't give a and M an inch, score the frickin touchdown. They have to score eight points to tie the game and hope to go to overtime. That's what you got to do. They had three timeouts, you absolutely score. Lenores goes in there. Heroic moment like that is a.
[00:09:43] As if there was questions of his legacy. Like that is a legacy ceiling moment. And there's been so many that you could point to. The Clemson run, right? The Tennessee flop, the, you know, and in this season, this moment, there's these heroic plays that Lenores has it you just don't find all the time, you know, and it's like it's the Connor Shaw type of mentality that you're laying it all on the line for the team and that's what great players do, right? They have, they rise to the moment. And Lenoris had a winding road to get to where he is right now, where folks are talking about him as being a Heisman dark horse now again.
[00:10:35] And it wasn't always pretty, but he is on a different level right now and it's a blessing to watch. And yeah, like, again, like this game was tough sledding like this, this game was, it started a little funky.
[00:10:50] You got the offense clicking a little bit then, then Sellers goes down. But A and M's defense was playing with, with high effort. They were not allowing our run game to get going. I believe it was a season low for South Carolina and it was a, it was a fricking battle like this. This was a, this was the type of game where we've been on the wrong side of it for too many times to count.
[00:11:16] And it's that SEC type of rock fight, you know, down in the dirt dog fight type of game.
[00:11:25] And we've been on the wrong side of these for a while and it's been times where we've questioned the toughness and the coaching and things like that. Not in this game.
[00:11:34] This team rallied.
[00:11:35] It was a one point game at the half and then you go down, you're, you know, you're, you were losing the game going, going into the fourth quarter and then you marched on the field and you take the lead and you stand 10 toes down, you defend the lead and then you go and you, you put the game away.
[00:11:53] So look, Lenoris is Going to get the headlines about this game, and rightfully so, as he should. Again, that's a legacy defining moment.
[00:12:04] But the defense, the defense absolutely needs their flowers. They are the reason we won this game. Like, let that be heard.
[00:12:14] They did not allow Texas A and M to get in the end zone. They held them to nine points. And in the first and fourth quarter, they held A&M to zero points.
[00:12:25] Like, I saw this.
[00:12:28] I saw this stat. It's insane.
[00:12:31] South Carolina is the first team in college football history to allow 450 total yards of offense, force zero turnovers, and not give up a touchdown.
[00:12:42] That is battling. That is the definition of bend, don't break. And that's what this. That's what this was.
[00:12:49] I mean, freaking Brock Osweiler on the telecast said it a thousand times, but like, A M was playing with more effort and intensity than they had really all year on offense, at least in the last several weeks, like, they looked better. Like, you know, like Reed looked a little bit more comfortable in the pocket. Their run game was. Was going. They were. They were getting those chunk plays, but we kept them out of the end zone on the critical third downs we got off the field.
[00:13:18] And when it mattered most late in the game, you made the huge plays. The D line. Gabe Brown Lodindi against his former team, making that huge play might not have gotten the, you know, technical sack on Reed late in the game, but he was right there. And, you know, the whole D line was right behind him.
[00:13:37] Like those guys were getting after it. You saw good effort by the linebackers.
[00:13:42] The DBs had their challenges, but again, like, doing enough when it mattered.
[00:13:48] And then at the very end, yeah, we can, we can sit here and I can certainly gripe about going to three down linemen. You know, it's the whole, like, prevent defense prevents you from winning the game. And it almost felt like that because A and M was moving at a clip. We were playing off the ball. Three down lineman, really, if you looked closely on a lot of those snaps, it was two guys rushing the ball. They just really didn't want Reed to. To make that play with his legs.
[00:14:20] But they get down, you know, close enough to our end zone and time is expiring and you get. And you get the one play and you did exactly what you had to do. Right? Like, Reed was flustered in those final couple of snaps and, and he overthrew. He overthrew the receiver in the end zone. Like DB was playing in phase.
[00:14:43] The defense absolutely needs credit in this one. And it was exactly that it's the definition of a bend, don't break moment for this defense, but to keep them out of the end zone entirely is incredibly impressive.
[00:14:57] And because the game was so close, like, because of what the defense did, it allowed Lenores to settle back in in that third quarter because he was not comfortable in those first couple of drives. And once he settled in and we figured out, like, how. How this is going to work, the defense kept us in the game. You get to the fourth quarter, adrenaline's pumping, home crowd is behind you, and you go out, you retake the lead, and then you absolutely have that fantastic series where you get Reed rattled, you get the ball back, and then the rest is history. So, I mean, this is a. This is a total team win here.
[00:15:39] It was not pretty, but again, like, how many times has South Carolina been in these types of games where it's just ugly seven to six at halftime, right? It's like, how many times have we been in that situation where we end up on the losing side of this? And you're like, oh, my God, like, all you had to do was make one play here, one play there, don't miss that kick, and it's a different story. That's not what this team did.
[00:16:04] And Lenores got hurt, like, comes out, comes back in, rallies the troops. It's. It's a total team win.
[00:16:15] It was. It was never going to be pretty the rest of the way like this. We're still playing in the sec, and, yeah, A and M coming off of the buy looked a hell of a lot better than they did before their bye week.
[00:16:29] But eventually they settled back to what they've been, and that's a disappointing team, and we were able to take advantage of that in the critical moments, and that's exactly what you have to do.
[00:16:41] And look, next week, you're going to Arkansas, a team that's been incredibly disappointing, but you can't take them lightly. Like, case in point right here, you just never know what's going to happen. But this team right now is playing together. They're playing for each other.
[00:16:58] Shane Beamer seems to have his hand on the pulse of what this team needs to do. Kendall Briles, that was not coming easy for him this game, but he settled down and he looked at that play, Sheen, and he knew exactly what we had to do. And, you know, credit to him and credit to Lenores for just having the guts to execute that play late.
[00:17:17] And then defensively, you know, these guys stepped up in critical moments, and Fred Johnson played his ass off Dindy played his ass off, you know, and they should all take solace in that. Like when push came to shove, everyone stepped up in those critical moments. Everyone. Orson hit. Orson hitting that kick in the fourth quarter after the miss, shaking it off huge.
[00:17:43] Got us the lead back.
[00:17:44] Defense in the drive in the. In the second to last drive from A M. Huge. Last drive from A M. Massive.
[00:17:53] And then the offense late in the game to be able to move the ball and get in a position to win and then to score. Everyone did their job.
[00:18:02] Everyone did their job. And you're sitting here bowl eligible, by the way, like all caught up in the hoopla in this Gamecocks are bowl eligible. Our sights are set much higher than you know, that six, that six win bowl. But again, like from where this team was just a few weeks ago to now sitting at 6 and 3, 4 and 3 in the SEC, you're smacking the middle of the conference now.
[00:18:24] Let the chips fall where they may. We'll see what the college football rankings put us on Tuesday.
[00:18:31] Keep this thing rolling. Let Lenores get healthy. I will personally bring him ice and Advil. If that's what's required of me to get him back healthy, I will do so.
[00:18:42] But enjoy this one.
[00:18:44] It's a blast.
[00:18:46] And with that, y' all wraps up this episode. Please follow me on social media, Twitter or X is Cox Gamecocks. 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.
