While there is excitement and intrigue surrounding South Carolina's upcoming football season, it may be a "hard sell" for fans to be overly excited about the opener. While many of the games from season's first full slate this weekend offer some marquee matchups, the Gamecocks opening with Georgia State is probably not one of those.
However, that is exactly what teams like Georgia State want when they go into these types of games. They hope the opponent is not overly energized or motivated in taking them on. That's is exactly the type of thing, that Georgia State has used to its advantage in the past. The Panthers just started their football program in 2010 and in less than a decade, shocked SEC opponent winning on "Rocky Top" 38-30, in the 2019 season opener. They then nearly duplicated the feat at Auburn last year. The Panthers led 24-19 until late in the 4th when Auburn rallied to score twice and win 34-24.
Georgia State is led by Head Coach Shawn Elliott, a Midlands native and a former Gamecock Assistant. If you remember back to the 2015 season, Elliott became the Interim Head Coach at South Carolina when Steve Spurrier left mid-season. The Gamecocks went just 1-5 under Elliott to finish the season. He was then passed over by the administration, as they hired Will Muschamp as their new Head Coach. I am sure Elliott has some extra motivation to want to win this game and show the SC Administration what they missed out on.
Shane Beamer was then hired after the Muschamp hire ended in disastser. Muschamp was 2 games under .500 overall at South Carolina, that doesn't sound that terrible right? Well, if you look at how he finished out his tenure, you'll see the Gamecocks went 6-14 in his last 20 games. Beamer came in and went 7-6 in year number one, a year where they were thin at several key spots including QB.
It was Beamer's time at Oklahoma, where he developed a relationship with highly touted QB Spencer Rattler. It was that relationship that helped get Rattler to decide to come to Columbia after announcing that he was transferring. Which Rattler's transfer, the return of defensive stars like former Hanna High star Zacch Pickens and Cam Smith and Beamer's energy and zest for the position, are what have created the intrigue around the program in year two, Despite what is probably perceived as a lackluster opener.
South Carolina hosts Georgia State, Saturday night at 7:30 at Williams Brice. The game will be televised on SEC Network + and ESPN +. On Wednesday, Beamer participated in the SEC Media Conference Call. I sat in on the SEC Teleconference, below are the full comments from Coach Beamer.
