Juju McDowell, Christian Beal-Smith ready to anchor South Carolina run game in Gator Bowl
With both Jaheim Bell and MarShawn Lloyd departing the South Carolina football program via the transfer portal, the Gamecocks will be down their top two rushers in the Gator Bowl.
South Carolina will now rely on Juju McDowell and Christian Beal-Smith to help set the tone on the ground against Notre Dame.
“It’s next man up,” Beal-Smith said. “Everybody has a role…everybody has to practice like they’re the number one guy.”
To that point, McDowell said the departures of Lloyd and Bell open up opportunities for himself and other players in the running back room.
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“It does a lot,” McDowell said. “It’s pretty much the same people, the same game plan but of course (when) you lose people, other people are gonna get more opportunities, but it’s the same thing.”
For now, McDowell and Beal-Smith are the only running backs on South Carolina’s two-deep roster. The combination of their talents should provide a thunder and lightning of sorts for an offense that struggled with consistency in the run game.
“I feel like there’s gonna be great complimentary football,” McDowell said. “(We’re) gonna be a great one-two-punch, but we didn’t lose too much from the run game.”
With the departures on offense, Beal-Smith stressed that South Carolina’s offense still hasn’t changed at its core.
“(The) offense hasn’t changed at all,” Beal-Smith said. “I mean, we’re running the same plays, doing the same things, just a different guy calling the game now.”
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Beal-Smith confessed he hadn’t felt 100 percent from a health standpoint all year, but currently feels the best he’s felt all year.
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Despite this, he still feels that he and McDowell can still be productive together.
“Speed and power, you know, I’m used to just being in the tackles and Juju does really well in space,” Beal-Smith said.
That combination will be vital against a solid Notre Dame run defense.
“They’re really well fitting the run, they got two really good linebackers and a good front four,” Beal-Smith said. “It’s gonna be a trenches game really, just getting the o-line up to the linebackers, and we’re gonna have to make one guy miss.”
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Although the running back room was hit hard by roster turnover, McDowell said it’s brought the position group – and the offense as a whole – together.
“I feel like we actually got closer, kind of by choice, but also kind of because it was mandatory,” McDowell said. “Losing two key factors of the offense, it’s kind of rough. But at the same time, coach Beamer, he prided us in having the closest team in the country. He challenged us to see if we could take that step forward to be accountable and still progress as a team and that’s what we’ve been doing.”
The message that Beamer has harped on during bowl season is one that the entire offense can take heed of.
“Be ourselves, being consistent because as y’all have seen the past few weeks, or towards the end of the season, we’re playing Carolina football. And that’s been our biggest focus is to play Carolina football – it’s all about us. So, it’s been a priority, just maintaining that focus inside of the building. And carrying that on outside and onto the field.”
