South Carolina run defense turning page on 2021 struggles
South Carolina’s defensive players spoke all preseason about an added commitment to stopping the run.
The Gamecocks will find out how much that’s improved quickly.
The run defense will have a tough test to begin the 2022 season when Georgia State comes into town Saturday night.
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“What they do on film is what they do,” Jordan Strachan said. “It’s real obvious. They’re trying to run the ball.”
The Panthers were consistently good when they ran the football last season.
Georgia State averaged five yards per rush last year with 1.9 scores on the ground. The team finished third in the Sun Belt with 24 rushes of at least 20 yards.
Tucker Gregg, the team’s rushing leader in 2021, will headline this year’s running back room. Last season, he fell 47 yards short of reaching a 1,000-yard campaign for the first time in his career.
Former Gamecock Jamyest Williams was almost equally good as his counterpart, Gregg, last year. The one-time defensive back turned running back tallied 859 yards and nine touchdowns, with a team-best 6.7 yards per rush.
Former Georgia State teammate, and current South Carolina starter, Strachan knows what Williams can do when the ball is in his hands.
“When I played with him 2020 year, he’s a great athlete, we had to be on our toes trying to get a guy down like that,” Strachan said at his Tuesday media availability. “We’re going to be ready and Jam, he’s bringing a lot to the table, but so are we.”
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Likewise, starting quarterback Darren Grainger can run just as well as he can throw the ball. He was the top rusher amongst Sun Belt quarterbacks, compiling 660 yards and three scores on 133 attempts.
With a host of talent on the opposing sideline, the Gamecocks will have their work cut out for them.
Last season the Gamecocks were dead last in the SEC in stuff rate and allowed 4.7 yards per rush, third-worst in the league. Only Missouri and Vanderbilt allowed more yards per rush.
For the duration of preseason camp, Clayton White’s defense has emphasized getting better in this area. Whether the adjustments made will work remains to be seen.
“The main thing about this group is that we want to make sure that we coach with a chip on our shoulder,” White said at his Wednesday media availability.
“I feel like every day I wake up, I have something to prove. We’re trying to give that mindset to our guys. We want that chip on our shoulder to be so big that you can’t even turn around.”
This will be White’s third time seeing Georgia State’s offense. During his time at Western Kentucky, he coached against them in a pair of bowl games in 2017 and 2020.
In those matchups, both losses, the Hilltoppers combined to allow 370 yards and three touchdowns on the ground.
“They’re a good football team. Their quarterback, Grainger, he’s a really good player. Their running back, Gregg, and they have Williams at tailback, really good player. They’re downhill, 227 yards a game,” White said. “Their offensive line is very experienced…They’re physical and have a lot of pride and so do we.”
Once game day arrives, head coach Shane Beamer plans to have South Carolina ready to match Georgia State’s hunger to win.
“They’ve shown that they will not be intimidated coming in here. And you got a lot of ties actually, obviously 20 players on their team from South Carolina including (Grainger), so we know what this game means to them,” Beamer said at his Tuesday media availability. “Certainly our guys are going to be extremely excited to go play but we have to go play well.”
