Steve Spurrier is all of us when it comes to South Carolina not playing traditional SEC opponents
As excited as South Carolina football fans are for the Gamecocks to kick off their 2024 campaign in nine days, something feels just a little, well, different about this year’s slate.
South Carolina is used to playing one of the most difficult schedules in the country each year as the Gamecocks traditionally take on Clemson plus a slate of former SEC East staples every season.
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The Tigers are, of course, still on the docket for this year but something is missing — namely Georgia, Florida, and Tennessee.
Former South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier was a guest this week on Stephen Garcia and Patrick DiMarco’s new podcast, Tailgate Talks with DiMarco and Garcia, and unsurprisingly did not hold back when asked his opinion on expansion and its effect on the Gamecocks schedule.
“Ooh, terrible, gosh,” Spurrier said. “I tell you what, I think I would have protested. South Carolina does not play Florida, Georgia, or Tennessee. Now, how can you do that? Huh? They don’t play any of those this year.”
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[Win two tickets to the South Carolina-Old Dominion football game]
The Gamecocks keep Texas A&M, their most recent permanent opponent from the old SEC West, Vanderbilt, and Missouri on the slate but add Oklahoma, Alabama, Ole Miss, and LSU instead of playing what used to be called the “orange crush” part of the schedule before Spurrier arrived.
The Head Ball Coach arrived in Columbia in 2005 bringing a new sense of confidence, quickly taking down both Florida and Tennessee in Year 1 and Georgia by Year 3.
For most of Spurrier’s 11-plus years in Columbia, and even the years following, the matchups with those three schools served as a yearly measuring stick for the program with the Gamecocks winning their share.
“When Mike McGee offered me the job,” Spurrier recalled. “I told Jerri, I said, ‘Let’s go to South Carolina and see what we can do there, okay?’ She said, ‘SEC. We have to play Georgia, Tennessee, and Florida?’ I said, ‘Jerri, we get to play Florida, Georgia, and Tennessee.'”
