South Carolina/Tennessee Review and Preview USC/Arkansas

If you watched the South Carolina/Tennessee contest on Saturday night as a casual fan, then odds are pretty good you did not watch the entire game. The inept offense that both of these SEC East divisional rivals displayed for four quarters could put to sleep even the toughest insomniac! Through two-thirds of the football schedule, Carolina fans should resound ourselves to ugly football down the stretch. I expect the remaining games to be nail biters, with the exception being The Citadel, which is sandwiched between Florida and Clemson. I could care less how South Carolina wins, and I’ll take a win on Rocky Top any way I can get it. I sat in Neyland Stadium and witnessed a 55-3 bludgeoning at the hands of the Volunteers in 1993, so I’ll take any victory on Rocky Top. South Carolina has now won two games (2-14) in Knoxville all-time. Let’s not kid ourselves about Tennessee either. This UT program has hit rock bottom, and it might be one of the least talented teams in the SEC, along with Ole Miss, Kentucky and Vanderbilt. There is no Peyton Manning or Tee Martin at quarterback or any Leonard Little or Al Wilson on defense. This Tennessee team was devoid of two of its top three players, QB Tyler Bray (broken thumb) and WR Justin Hunter (torn ACL), and started a freshman quarterback, Justin Worley, against one of the top three defenses in the SEC. That is not a recipe for success in the SEC for one of the traditional SEC powers that has fallen on some hard times since the end of the 2008 season. So let’s take a look at the Good, the Bad & the Ugly from Rocky Top on Saturday night.

The Good:
→The Gamecocks have won six true consecutive road games in school history. Dating back to last year, USC has beaten Vanderbilt, Florida, Clemson, Georgia, Mississippi State and Tennessee consecutively.
→Steve Spurrier won his 51st game as Head Football Coach at the University of South Carolina. SOS is now 51-34 in less than seven full seasons at South Carolina. That is a 60% winning percentage. Spurrier is second all-time on USC’s Career Wins List for USC football coaches, trailing only Rex Enright (64 all-time wins).
→Under Spurrier, USC is now 4-3 versus Tennessee with two road wins (2005 & 2011) in Knoxville, TN.
→South Carolina has won back-to-back games (2010 & 2011) versus Tennessee for the first time ever!
→Since 2005 under the Spurrier regime, South Carolina is 20-14 versus the SEC East. USC has never swept its SEC East divisional opponents in football!
→The victory in Knoxville Saturday night brought USC back to a .500 record (47-47) in SEC football since 2000.
→The Gamecocks reached five wins in SEC Conference play for the fifth time in the last dozen years with the victory over Tennessee Saturday night.
→Blythewood, SC native running back Brandon Wilds achieved career highs in Rushing Yards (137) and Rushing Attempts (28) in his first career start in place of Marcus Lattimore.
→Connor Shaw becoming only the third USC quarterback to win his first four career starts. The other two Gamecock QB's to accomplish this feat: Steve Tanneyhill and Chris Smelley.
→The USC Rushing attack eclipsed 200 yards rushing for the fifth time this season. Carolina rushed for greater than 200 yards versus ECU, UGA, Navy, UK and UT. The Gamecocks rank 23rd in Rushing Offense of all FBS teams, per NCAA.
→The gutsy 4th & 1 play call that gave Carolina a 7-3 lead. Connor Shaw lofted a pass to a wide open TE Rory Anderson for a 23-yard scoring pass after UT sold-out against the anticipated running play.
→The 98-yard, 20-play scoring drive in the third quarter that chewed up 11 minutes and 35 seconds and gave South Carolina a comfortable 14-3 lead. 17 plays were running plays that compiled 74 yards.
→Kudos to redshirt freshman Cody Gibson for hustling downfield and tackling UT cornerback Prentiss Wagner at the two-yard line and preserving a slim 7-3 USC lead. Gibson’s effort earned him a game ball after the win, per Steve Spurrier.
→ The USC defense has now surrendered 58 points to its last six opponents (5-1), which equates to 9.6 points per game. South Carolina’s defense has now forced 18 turnovers (fourteen INTs & four fumble recoveries) in the last 24 quarters! Also, Ellis Johnson’s stop troops held a third SEC offense to under 200 total yards this season (Vanderbilt, Kentucky & Tennessee). South Carolina’s defense has held two SEC opponents (Kentucky & Vanderbilt) to less than 100 yards.
→ The USC Pass Defense held freshman Justin Worley to 10-26 pass completions-to-pass attempts for 38% completion rate and two interceptions. The Gamecocks are ranked third in Pass Defense (trailing Michigan State and Alabama) in FBS, per NCAA.
→After forcing two more turnovers against Tennessee, USC now is tied for second in the FBS category of Turnovers Gained with Rutgers.
→South Carolina Third-Down Conversion Rate for Defense was excellent, as Tennessee only converted 14% (2/14).

The Bad:
→USC Passing yards totaled 87! Shaw only completed 55% of his attempts (10/18) and threw one interception.
→Alshon Jeffery only caught three passes for 17 yards and looked disgruntled a few times when Shaw did not throw Jeffery the football.
→The USC pass protection is just terrible! The two tackles (Gibson & Watkins) seem to get beat consistently and Shaw rarely has more than three seconds before he is running for his life.
→The USC offense managed only 27 first quarter yards of total offense.
→The Gamecocks have now fallen behind in 11 straight football games. The last time USC took an early lead was versus Troy in 2010.

The Ugly:
→The Tennessee football program has fallen a lot further than most people realize. I saw zero difference makers on the field for the Volunteers on Saturday night.
→Special Teams again lets down USC. Since the UGA game, the Gamecocks special teams has been anything but extraordinary. Ace Sanders fumbled a punt that set up Tennessee with a short field that resulted in a Field Goal.
→Neyland Stadium crowd---the upper decks looked sparse, and the UT faithful appear to have lost interest in this program.
Looking forward to the Arkansas game, USC will have its highly ranked pass defense tested against a pass heavy Razorbacks team. Arkansas is averaging a little more than 320 passing yards per game, which ranks top ten in FBS. The Razorbacks rush for less than 138 yards per game and score a little less than 37 points per game. Arkansas is 9-10 in SEC conference play in Fayetteville since Spurrier arrived in Columbia. Last year, the Razorbacks had a veteran o-line and an NFL quarterback (Ryan Mallett). This year, Arkansas starts a freshman at Left Tackle, and new quarterback Tyler Wilson has been taking a pounding behind a revamped o-line that has given up 17 sacks (same as USC’s o-line has given up). The Razorbacks defense has been suspect, and the Hawgs surrendered 462 total yards (222 rushing yards/240 passing yards) to a Vanderbilt squad this past Saturday that USC’s defense held to 73 total yards earlier in the season.

My next blog will be Wednesday when I’ll have a South Carolina football redshirt report.

Go Gamecocks!