Shane Beamer talks Zeb Noland, return of Luke Doty

Shane Beamer picked up a win in his first game at South Carolina. But the 46-0 win over Eastern Illinois did not come withouts its share of drama. The first-year coach had to start a grad assistant turned quarterback Saturday night due to lack of depth at the position.

Zeb Noland got the job done, however, throwing four first-half touchdown passes and finishing 13-of-22 for 121 yards. Noland traded in his whistle for a helmet when expected starter Luke Doty injured his left foot earlier in the preseason. And while the Gamecocks had backup Jason Brown available, Nolan got the nod.

“It was good, poise and collected,” Beamer said of Noland’s performance in his postgame press conference. “We need to be better as an offense, being efficient. We did a nice job for the most part, but we have a lot of plays out there that we didn’t get lined up quite the right way or motion was off. Things like that, that we need to clean up.

“But overall, Zeb did a nice job of running the offense and made some throws, ad-libbed on some plays in the first half. Being able to get to second reads and making things right when it wasn’t quite right. I thought he did a nice job.”

Beamer is not planning on using Noland as his starting quarterback for the rest of the season, especially when SEC play comes around. While Noland has experience as a quarterback at North Dakota State and Iowa State, Beamer is hoping expected starting quarterback Luke Doty will be available for South Carolina’s Week 2 game against East Carolina.

“We expect Luke to be full speed by the end of the week, next Saturday,” Beamer said.

Zeb Noland before arrival at South Carolina

Noland played three seasons at Iowa State before transferring to North Dakota State last season. There, he was expected to back up third-overall pick Trey Lance. COVID-19, however, postponed the FCS season to the spring, prompting Lance to leave in order to prepare for the NFL Draft. Noland stepped up to the starting job and threw for 721 yards with five touchdowns and six interceptions in the spring.

“We’ve got a lot of confidence in Zeb being able to go out there and operate at a high level on Saturday night,” Beamer said earlier this week. “We’re not asking him to go out there and win the football game, we’ll never ask our quarterbacks to do that. We’re going to ask him to get us in and out of the huddle cleanly and efficiently, without pre-snap penalties.”