When Justin Stepp played football at Pelion (S.C.) High School, he wanted to go on to play at South Carolina in nearby Columbia. That didn’t end up happening, though, as he instead played at Furman from 2003-06.

Now, Stepp finally has an opportunity to be part of the Gamecocks’ program. He was named the team’s wide receivers coach last week, as he’ll join the new staff being assembled by head coach Shane Beamer.

And as Stepp told the media during a press conference on Monday, there’s no other job that could have gotten him to leave Arkansas, where he had been the wide receivers coach the past three seasons. Part of that’s because of how hard he pushed to try to get to South Carolina as a player back in the day.

“Those guys on the staff had to be like, ‘Man, this kid ain’t figured it out yet that we’re not going to recruit him,’ but I was in those stands every day, every Saturday, coming to every game. I wore some of those coaches out trying to get up there every Saturday,” Stepp told the media. “This is it. There’s no other job in the country I would have left for but to be right here in Columbia.”

Stepp’s first coaching job at an FBS program came at Clemson, where he was a graduate assistant from 2009-11. He went on to be the wide receivers coach at Appalachian State (2012-14), SMU (2015-17) and Arkansas (2018-20).

Now, Stepp will look to help lead South Carolina’s offense to success. He’ll work alongside Marcus Satterfield, who was recently named the Gamecocks’ offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach.