What Shane Beamer learned from questionable coaching decisions after Ole Miss loss

Shane Beamer undoubtedly heard plenty about why he shouldn’t have done it. But even days after it happened, he still has no regrets about it.

“I am going to say this and people are going to be like, ‘Oh my God. Beamer said he doesn’t regret the fake punt.’ I don’t regret calling the fake punt,” Beamer said.

During South Carolina’s first drive in an eventual 27-3 loss to Ole Miss last Saturday, Beamer elected to bring his punt unit out on 4th and 1 at the Gamecocks’ 36-yard line. Only the fourth-year head coach had no intention of actually punting.

Beamer planned to run a fake punt to try and catch the Rebels off guard and pick up the first down. But the play didn’t work out as intended. Maurice Brown II, lined up as the upback, took the direct snap four yards away, ran up the middle and was stopped — nowhere close to the first down marker.

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As a result, it blew up in South Carolina’s face and Ole Miss went down and scored a touchdown five plays later. Beamer’s goal was to get the snap off quickly in hopes the Rebels wouldn’t be ready for it. Looking back at how the play went down, he wished he would’ve called a timeout to rethink the decision and just punt or make sure the players were on the same page to execute it how he wanted them to.

“I am mad at myself for not calling timeout before the snap because the whole key on that play was to spring up to the line as quick as possible thinking that their defensive tackles would not been their stance yet, which they weren’t. Then, snap the ball really, really quick and we needed to get a yard,” Beamer said.

“If you look at us, we get to the line of scrimmage really quick, defensive tackles are standing up. There’s one actually pointing and not even looking at the ball. If we just snap it then, it’s successful.”

As Beamer watched the punt team jog onto the field, he already knew the set up for the play was taking much longer than anticipated. With how long it took for everything to unfold, it gave Ole Miss more time to adjust and get ready. At this moment, that’s when Beamer thought back to himself knowing he should’ve just called a timeout. But he didn’t.

“That is one that I kick myself in the butt for still. I told the team, it is like a car wreck in slow motion and I could see it happening and I didn’t call timeout,” Beamer said. “You see it Shane, call a timeout. I let it ride and I had faith that we could make it work. The longer it went and the less likely that was to work. … That was one that I wish I had been a little bit more decisive and just call timeout and don’t snap it.”

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The decisive fake punt ended up being one of many questionable decisions made by Beamer in Saturday’s loss. He accepted a holding penalty that put Ole Miss in 1st and 20 when declining it would have set up a 2nd and 17 play.

He also decided to try and kick a field goal on the opening possession of the second half when his team was down by 21 points. Sixth-year kicker Alex Herrera missed the 38-yard kick, which wouldn’t have made a difference in the game even if it went through the uprights.

Needless to say, this game was a wake up call for Beamer. Plenty of puzzling choices were made. The 24-point loss proved to be a big teaching moment for Beamer and showed how much self-inflicted mistakes can add up and prove costly.

As South Carolina gets ready to head to Tuscaloosa this weekend to face No. 7 Alabama, Beamer knows him, along with his entire staff, need to coach better. And when it comes down to it, have the best judgement to make the right decisions to put the team in situations to win.

“I told our staff (Monday), ‘We have coaches that love to coach. Players that love to play, let’s do a great job of doing that this week and be better than what we were,'” Beamer said. “It’s every game that I look at how can I be better and mistakes I made. I made a bunch of them on Saturday and certainly need to be better this week, for sure.”

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