Will Muschamp’s tenures at Florida and South Carolina have had their ups and downs. One constant, however, has been Coach Boom’s knack for beating Tennessee. Muschamp is 6-0 against UT in his coaching career with the chance to make it 7-0 Saturday.

The third-year South Carolina coach took part in the weekly media teleconference Wednesday to talk about his team and preview the game.

On the defense, are they playing up to your standard?

  • No, we have been very inconsistent in the run game. Our depth is young, but talented. I thought our linebackers played their best games against A&M. We lack depth on front seven. That was a concern heading into the year and we have been far too inconsistent.

On Deebo Samuel, has he been as explosive this year?

  • He’s been limited in his opportunities to return kicks, he’s only had a couple and we don’t block well when he does. We try to target him in the passing game, give him sweeps.

On the challenge of taking over a 3-9 team:

  • When you have a young team in this league, they can be fragile. you have to harden them for what they are going to handle, not only physically but mentally. you have to know how to pull off, too.

On this year’s Tennessee team:

  • I think they have playmakers on the perimeter, they have speed. I think [QB Jarrett] Guarantano is a tough young man, he hangs in the pocket, I think defensively they have some outstanding players. they are young in the secondary but are playing well for Jeremy. When you go to Jordan-Hare and win, that’s big

On being 6-0 vs. Tennessee as a head coach:

  • We’ve had more points after playing them. I don’t know, it was always an early game there are Florida, these South Carolina game could have went either way, we just made the plays when we needed to in those games