Shane Beamer: Freshman Markee Anderson will play in 2023
Not that it’s surprising or even necessarily newsworthy considering the early strong reviews this spring but South Carolina football coach Shane Beamer definitively removed any doubt Thursday whether freshman offensive lineman Markee Anderson would play as a true freshman.
Speaking at the Greenville stop of this year’s Welcome Home Tour about 30 minutes from where the former four-star prospect starred at Dorman High School, Beamer was asked about the true freshman who enrolled at South Carolina in January to go through spring practice with the Gamecocks.
“Markee will play this year,” Beamer said. “What a really good player from Dorman. What a great young man. He’s so smart and that’s the thing. It was obviously a benefit for him going through spring practice with us but he’s just so football intelligent. He’s really, really smart from a football standpoint and academic standpoint. He’s a really good player and with our depth on the offensive line, he’s going to play this year. It’s harder for true freshmen to play, the closer they are to the ball in my opinion, meaning the linemen, but if anybody can do it, it’s Markee, and couldn’t be more excited about having someone from Dorman in our program and couldn’t be more excited about it being him.”
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It isn’t the first time the Gamecocks’ head coach has raved about Anderson.
Both Beamer and offensive line coach Lonnie Teasley bragged about Anderson’s smarts during spring practice.
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At the time, it seemed like the freshman was already on track to potentially play, but as Beamer alluded to, Carolina’s depth was altered by the loss of left tackle Jaylen Nichols, who will miss at least the start of the season due to an injury suffered in the spring game.
The 6-foot-4, 320-pounder started the spring working with the second team at left guard but eventually also took snaps at left tackle and it’s that versatility that could have him as one of the next men up in the rotation after the perceived starting five.
“Markee is a pleasure to coach. He’s extremely smart. He’s one of those guys where if you teach him something, he’s got it,” Teasley said during the spring. “He can recall information that I taught him back when he first got here…He’s got it. He’s a smart dude and he’s hungry. He wants to be really good. Physically he’s heavy-handed. He’s an SEC offensive lineman.”
