Shane Beamer on if coaching staff changes are done: 'You never say never'

South Carolina underwent a notable staff shake up over the weekend, as special teams coordinator Pete Lembo left to take the head coaching gig at Buffalo. And days before the news went public, head coach Shane Beamer said he wasn’t expecting too much more to change on his staff.

Speaking to reporters on Friday, though, Beamer said he wouldn’t rule out any changes, either. It was evidently a smart promise to avoid, and one Beamer has learned from past experience is wise not to make.

“I was on spring break last year, driving to the airport with my wife in what was that, the second week of March?” Beamer said “And I’m about to get on a plane and go to Mexico for a week and I get a call from the Baltimore Ravens, wanting to talk to Sterling Lucas. In March. I love the NFL, God bless ’em, but their hiring processes are maybe great for the people in the NFL, I don’t know — they’re not great if they and hire college coaches.”

And while Beamer understands the NFL timeline for hiring coaches means his staff could have someone get plucked in February, he tries to make it clear to the coaches he hires that they need to be committed to staying with the Gamecocks once that window mostly closes after the Super Bowl.

“Because a lot of these guys, they don’t get a job until after the Super Bowl or right around the Super Bowl and then they go to the combine or whatever and then it gets to be late February, March, and they’re trying to hire coaches,” Beamer said about NFL staffs getting filled out. “So February is still a time where NFL teams are trying to hire coaches.

Beamer continued: “I never want to stop a guy from being able to advance his career, but that was part of the reason there was an extension with Sterling, as well. That’s kind of going back to last year, because there were multiple NFL teams that reached out to him. Again, our guys want to be here and want to make sure they understand, too, that once we get off the road and we have signing day and it’s a long weekend to kind of catch our breath as coaches, our obligation is to our football team. So we don’t need to be out job hunting when we get into the end of February. That’s our staff and we’re moving forward at that point,” Beamer said.

The good news for the Gamecocks seems to be that after Lembo’s departure for a head coaching gig, there aren’t likely to be many more departures.

And as Beamer discussed it prior to Lembo’s departure, it seemed like he might’ve known something the rest of the college football world soon found out.

“Feel like our guys want to be here, we’ve got some great coaches on this staff that I’m sure will have opportunities, so you never say never, but we’ve got a group that’s hungry and eager, all out on the road right now and eager to get going with our team, too,” Beamer said.