Will Muschamp may have his doubters but one thing you can certainly say about him is he doesn’t lose to Tennessee. The South Carolina coach earned yet another win over the Vols last weekend, setting up a nice bye week for this Gamecock program.

South Carolina now sits at 5-2 on the year with only three SEC games left on the schedule, two of which are at home.

Here’s a summary of what the South Carolina coach had to say during Wednesday’s SEC Coaches Teleconference:

  • Opening statement: “Just trying to get healthy for Vanderbilt. Other than that, I think we are in good shape.”
  • South Carolina has yet to sign a guy from Texas since A&M came into the SEC. Do you think you will change that? “We really only have about 4.5 million people in our state. We can’t sign enough guys from this state. So, we’ve got to be able to do a good job in North Carolina, Georgia and Florida and a little now in Tennessee in Nashville. Distance is often a breaking factor for families. Maybe if there’s a connection with a special player like a QB, we could do that but we will concentrate on our state and our surrounding areas first.”
  • What do you need to work on during the bye? “Offensively, we have to finish drives. At the end of the day, we haven’t done that. Both sides of the ball, third down. We were 5-for-5 on the last drive vs. Tennessee. That to me is huge. Defensively, we have struggled getting off the field. We have emphasized that.”
  • Thoughts on Jake Bentley helping Jarrett Guaranatano up after Tennessee game? “Well, Jake is mature beyond his years. He saw a guy that played well, their whole team really, there’s a respect level there. That’s what it’s all about. It speaks a lot about him and why he is who he is. He understands people. He was voted MVP of our team as a freshman because of the respect our team has for him.”