Scott Davis: End of the line draws near

Scott has followed South Carolina athletics for over 40 years and provides commentary from a fan perspective. He writes a weekly newsletter (sign up here) year-round and a column during football season that’s published each Monday on GamecockCentral.

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It feels like it’s over, doesn’t it?

After seven games, it feels mighty, miiiiighty close to being time for us to hang that infernal, well-worn “Wait ‘Til Next Year” banner from our front porches and start the process of mourning a much-hyped season that never seemed to get off the ground for even a split second. If we’re going to have to go through the Seven Stages of Grief anyway, we might as well get right into that first stage sooner rather than later.

We kept putting it off, waiting and waiting and waiting for our doom to lift. And there was reason to wait. After all, hadn’t this team made startling turnarounds in each of coach Shane Beamer’s first two seasons? Wouldn’t they shock somebody somewhere again? Wouldn’t these guys eventually get it going?

We’re still waiting.

Now, whatever hopes we had remaining for South Carolina football in 2023 seem almost foolish and quaint after yet another Saturday from Hell in the other Columbia.

And they were already modest hopes indeed: Most of us merely dreamed of seeing South Carolina do just enough the rest of the way to somehow stagger into a second-tier bowl game, keeping anything that remained of the program’s momentum from better-than-expected years in 2021 and 2022 chugging forward into the offseason. We just wanted the train to keep moving.

But it’s hard to even see the tracks up ahead after a 34-12 pasting by Missouri on Saturday that saw South Carolina outplayed in every phase of the game. It feels like this train is slowing down and the end of the line is at hand – we’re just waiting for someone to yell “last stop” on this star-crossed 2023 season.

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Mathematically, the Gamecocks are apparently still alive for the six wins they’d need to make a bowl game, and I suppose they’ll remain alive until they’re not. I should note that math was my worst subject in school, so I can’t confirm the accuracy of any of this. Also, I’m nauseous right now, and I don’t do my best calculations while nauseous. So, I can’t tell you exactly what the math says.

But I can tell you how it all feels.

It feels like one of the more disappointing and discouraging South Carolina seasons in recent memory.

And why wouldn’t it?

After all the good vibes and positive offseason juju roaring into that ballyhooed opener against North Carolina in front of the College GameDay cameras, and after so many tickets were sold for the team’s home games, and after the return of key players like quarterback Spencer Rattler and the ongoing love affair between the college football media and Shane Beamer, most of us certainly didn’t expect to be here right now.

But here we are, at 2-5, with Kentucky and Clemson and A&M to go (and for that matter, Vanderbilt and Jacksonville State).

Here we are, at the first true crossroads of the Shane Beamer Era, where the path taken next will determine whether the program finally establishes itself as an SEC team to be taken seriously or limps back into the near-eternal mediocrity that has defined it for too much of the past 30 years.

Here we are, back in that all-too-familiar terrain where fans are fire-bombing message boards and coordinator controversies are percolating and there are far more questions than answers regarding the upcoming offseason.

Here we are. Again.

Sure, there were warning signs everywhere that this might not be the dream season we all planned for it to be. Depth was an issue across the roster. The offensive line was raw and unproven. There were question marks in the secondary. There was, essentially, no experienced solution at running back entering the season. What’s more, several quality contributors left the program under odd circumstances for greener pastures in the transfer portal.

Yes, there were warning signs. Yes, there were red flags.

But it’s easy now, at 2-5, to reflect back on all the warning signs we should have been reading as we headed into the 2023 season.

Instead, I’d like you to look back to the morning of that first game against North Carolina and ask yourself how you felt. You felt excited, proud, adrenalized and ready, more than you had for any opening game since Steve Spurrier hung up the visor.

You felt like you were about to see something special unfold.

I did, too.

And when you juxtapose the way you felt then, on the morning of that North Carolina game, with the way you feel now, then you can surely understand why the frustration is real and loud and threatening to overwhelm a fan base that is always waiting for the rug to be pulled from beneath its feet.

Look, I understand all the mitigating circumstances. If you said to me that the Gamecocks have endured a dreadfully difficult schedule thus far, I would agree with you.

If you told me that injuries have been devastating to South Carolina’s hopes in 2023, I would agree with you again.

But there are enough good players on this roster that we should have been able to feel comfortable that the Gamecocks would go bowling somewhere at season’s end, as well as win an important game or two against an established opponent.

Instead, just over halfway through the season, we’re already dusting off that “Wait ‘Til Next Year” banner and readying it for another long winter.

And we’re starting to wonder exactly what we’re going to find when next year actually gets here.

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The Taylor Swift Game Balls of the Week

Look, this was a tough week for the Game Balls section of this column. This is one of those weeks where I wanted to give a Game Ball to something like “The Game Ending” (and in all seriousness – shout-out to the game ending). But we’ve got to give one to someone or something, so let’s toss one to…

Taylor Swift – My twin nieces went to see the new Taylor Swift concert movie on Friday night, and after seeing some video of them ecstatically bouncing and singing along with pure, unadulterated joy during the movie, I actually thought to myself, “If I was looking for a moment that represented the exact opposite of the way I’ve felt during this South Carolina football season, it would be this.” Maybe we all need to be turning to Taylor to find some joy right now. Which leads us right to…

South Carolina-Missouri Deflated Balls

Finding Some Joy – Shane Beamer urged fans to “find some joy” last year after the team beat Vanderbilt, and it became a minor rallying cry when the Gamecocks closed with wins over Tennessee and Clemson. I even saw a “Find Some Joy” T-shirt in a university bookstore near the South Carolina campus this summer. But outside of listening to Taylor Swift’s entire catalog on repeat, I’m having a hard time locating joy at the moment. Anybody know where I can find some? I don’t care how much money it would take – this university’s leaders need to do whatever they have to do to get a Taylor Swift concert scheduled for Williams-Brice Stadium ASAP. It might be the only thing that could turn this program around.

More Devastating Injuries? Really? – In a season when the South Carolina roster has been absolutely annihilated by injuries, one of the year’s few upbeat storylines has been the emergence of Xavier Leggette as an All-SEC caliber receiver to fill the void during Juice Wells’ absence from a broken foot. That’s why it was doubly crushing to learn that Leggette wouldn’t be returning to the game after injuring his upper body on a kickoff return. There are seasons when it’s not particularly enjoyable to be a football fan, and then there’s this season.

Another Sack? Really? – In what has been a recurring, “you can absolutely count on this with rock-solid certainty week-to-week” theme from the 2023 season, Spencer Rattler was pressured, harassed and chased up, down and across Faurot Field on Saturday. Rattler was sacked six times, just as he was when South Carolina played Tennessee earlier this season. Neither of those totals set the record for this season – he was sacked nine times against North Carolina. Maybe this wasn’t the best game Rattler has had in a South Carolina uniform, but it’s becoming impossible to even judge his performances at this point considering how much time he’s spent running for his life.

Mizzou Misery – I’m done talking about my frustration with this Missouri thing. I’ve spent too much time on it. I surrender.

Math – I was never good at it, and try as I might, I can’t tally up the formula that will get South Carolina to six wins by season’s end. They’ve got to win four times to get there, and you can’t get four all at once. So let’s start with one. Any one will do.

Waiting Until Next Year – Wasn’t fun the last 45 times I’ve tried it, and I can’t imagine it would be this year.

No, we didn’t think we’d be here this soon, not after just seven games. But here we are, blinking and stumbling as the lights get turned on and somebody somewhere gets ready to call for the end of the line.

We’re almost home now.

Tell me how South Carolina can still get to six wins in 2023 by writing me at [email protected].