Shane Beamer addresses facing Juice Wells as Ole Miss player, need for focus

Juice Wells will make his return to Columbia on Saturday when Ole Miss comes to town to face South Carolina. The receiver has made plenty of plays in the past at Williams-Brice Stadium for the home team, but will now look to do so for the opposition.

Gamecocks coach Shane Beamer was asked about balancing the emotions of having a former teammates return in his Tuesday press conference. He didn’t seem to hype it up too much, saying South Carolina has to treat it like any other game.

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“I think that’s every game,” he said. “You want to make sure you play with great poise. They’ve got a good football team and I know we’re gonna get the best version of Ole Miss. What we’re focusing on is that they get the best version of South Carolina. They’ve got a lot of really good players on offense.

“Juice is a good player, but when you sit there and watch (Tre Harris), they threw him the ball 15 times Saturday. So we better be not caught up in one player. We better be aware of him. Then we better know what a weapon the tight end is. The slot receiver, Cayden Lee, we recruited the heck out of him and he had a lot of targets on Saturday. The running back had a lot of targets in the passing game. So for us, it’ll just be they have a lot of really good players that we have to prepare for.”

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Wells recorded 68 catches for 928 yards and six touchdowns in 2023 at South Carolina. He hasn’t been as heavily featured in the Rebels offense to start this season, however.

He ranks well behind Tre Harris as the team’s top receiver from a statistical standpoint and isn’t commanding nearly as many targets as he did in Columbia. That said, he still has 14 catches for 274 yards and four touchdowns.

As Gamecocks fans are well aware, Wells is liable for a big performance any game and he’ll likely come with a little extra juice for this one. Kickoff between the Rebels in Juice Wells’ return to South Carolina is set for 3:30 p.m. ET at Williams-Brice Stadium.