Opponent preview: South Carolina set for hungry Mizzou defense

South Carolina will play with a ranking beside its name for the first time in four years. The No. 25 Gamecocks are riding high as winners of their last four games.

They’ll look to win their fifth game in a row this weekend. It’s a feat they haven’t matched since 2013. But it’s not going to be a cakewalk.

As of late, Missouri has owned the Palmetto Cup rivalry, winning its last three against the Gamecocks. The Tigers have struggled in conference play this year, sitting at 1-3. When diving deeper into the numbers though, it hasn’t been all bad.

“They’re a really talented team that has been in every single SEC game they’ve played this season,” Shane Beamer said. “They’ve got three losses in the SEC by three points, four points and seven points. So every game they’ve played in-conference this year has come down to one possession.”

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Missouri has kept games close against SEC opponents thanks to a stellar defense.

Defensive coordinator Blake Baker has turned his unit into one of the better defenses in college football. The Tigers are fourth in the SEC in total defense (326.4 yards per game) and eighth in scoring defense (23.1 points per game). They’re also tied for second with six interceptions this season.

It will be a hard afternoon for the Gamecocks if they can’t get anything going. Spencer Rattler has looked better but it will be on the players around him to do their part as well.

“We’ve got all the talent in the world, we just got to make plays—that’s what it comes down to,” Austin Stogner said. “I’ve said it a lot, but let’s win our one-on-one.”

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South Carolina showed signs of improvement in its win over Texas A&M. The offense went 8-for-16 on third downs, their best showing so far. Marcus Satterfield said it will be important for the Gamecocks to find ways to convert on short-yardage downs.

“We have to keep designing and formatting better angles for our guys and we’d have to go out there and execute,” Satterfield said. “Overall on third down, I think we’re around 42 percent or something. We’ve gotten better each week—we started really slow—and I think if you just look at the last four games, we’ve improved drastically on third down but short yardage we have to improve on.”

On the other side of the ball, Missouri’s offense hasn’t been nearly as good. The Tigers average 24 points and 364 yards per game, good for 12th in the SEC.

Granted, they’ve done a fine job controlling the clock with an average of 29:31 per game. But it hasn’t been enough to win the close games they’ve played.

Quarterback Brady Cook has had an up-and-down year, but he’s received help from his talented receivers. Dominic Lovett was rolling early on with a pair of 100+ receiving yard games but has cooled off lately with 12 yards against Vanderbilt last week. Mookie Cooper has been servicable as well but similar to Lovett, he didn’t do much against the Commodores with one catch for 15 yards.

As they’ve slowed down, Luther Burden III has heated up. The five-star freshman caught four passes for 66 yards and a touchdown last Saturday. He’s averaging 8.2 yards per catch.

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When Cam Smith was asked about the matchup issues Burden could present, he didn’t sound overly worried.

“I really don’t know about the brother like that,” Smith said. “I guess he’s a good player and stuff like that but I mean just take it day by day. Just like taking any other thing.”

If South Carolina wins Saturday, it will clinch bowl eligbility for the second straight year. It took the team until Nov. 20 to reach six wins a year ago.

While it would be a nice momento, Brad Johnson expressed the Gamecocks have bigger fish to fry.

“Coach Beamer has been emphasizing resisting comfort so really that’s what we’re trying to do,” Johnson said. “Anything that’s trying to make you comfortable this week before we go into Saturday and play, you want to stay away from it. You want to stay away from those pats on the back and all the love that you’re getting from the outside.”

“Just got to stay in and stay grounded with the people that you’re working with, grinding with every single day and move onto the next one. Every week is a new season and that’s how we’re looking at that, just resisting comfort.”

The Gamecocks will host Missouri at Williams-Brice Stadium at 4 p.m. Saturday afternoon. It’s also homecoming for South Carolina. The game will be televised on SEC Network with Taylor Zarzour, Matt Stinchcomb and Alyssa Lang on the call.

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