You have to go back a decade.

Ten years ago, South Carolina entered the 2014 season with an entrenched identity. Three consecutive top-10 finishes wasn’t just the peak of the Steve Spurrier era; it was the peak of the program. The Gamecocks could light up scoreboards with Spurrier running the offense and win a game with their smash-mouth defense, which former 5-star pass-rusher Jadeveon Clowney led for those 3 seasons.

Even post-Clowney, South Carolina had established itself well enough to earn a preseason No. 9 ranking. Perhaps of equal significance, the Gamecocks got smacked in the opener by post-Johnny Manziel Texas A&M and still bounced back with 3 consecutive victories — including a win against No. 6 Georgia — to earn a No. 13 ranking and a visit from College GameDay for the showdown against defending SEC East champion Mizzou.

But the Gamecocks blew a 2-score lead in the middle of the 4th quarter and spent the next decade fighting for an identity. South Carolina played as an unranked team in 109 of the next 112 games (the 3 games played as a ranked team were all losses).

On Saturday against LSU, South Carolina will make that 110 of the past 113 games played as an unranked team. But for the first time since that day in 2014, GameDay is returning to Columbia.

Some viewed that decision as underwhelming. Others called it SEC bias.

Here’s reality — College GameDay’s decision-makers watched last Saturday’s matchup against Kentucky knowing the winner had an upper hand to host the show (going to the same place as Big Noon Kickoff for the second consecutive week made Alabama-Wisconsin unlikely). UK would’ve been undefeated for the Brock Vandagriff reunion with Georgia while South Carolina would’ve been unbeaten with a borderline Top-25 team for a unique matchup against LSU.

The latter scenario played out, but it wasn’t just as simple as South Carolina beating Kentucky that cemented that decision. For the first time in a long time — perhaps a decade — the Gamecocks have a legitimate early-season identity.

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That pass rush is worth the price of admission. Outside of a couple of special teams units, it might just be South Carolina’s most obvious early-season strength of the post-Spurrier era. Sure, Shane Beamer has had some phenomenal special teams units and the late-season passing attack in 2022 was must-see TV, but what we’ve seen from the Gamecocks’ pass rush through 2 games is different. It’s the type of identity that could make South Carolina nationally relevant.

Why? Well, a big part of that is true freshman Dylan Stewart might be the program’s most disruptive defensive player since Clowney. The fellow former 5-star edge rusher is already doing freakish things.

So far, Stewart:

  • A) Has 2.5 sacks, 2 forced fumbles and 2 hurries on 35 pass-rush snaps
  • B) Has PFF’s No. 1 pass-rush grade in FBS
  • C) Had PFF’s highest-graded game for a Power 5 edge since 2020
  • D) Is taking on (and escaping) triple teams as an 18-year-old
  • E) All the above

It’s “E.” It’s always “E.”

Stewart is special. It doesn’t take long to watch him to realize that. The things that he did against Old Dominion in the opener would’ve been impressive against air:

Fair question. Stewart might have some growing pains, but clearly, he’s already worthy of being at the top of scouting reports.

You could argue that Georgia Tech transfer Kyle Kennard is also worthy of that type of attention. Kennard actually has better raw numbers than Stewart with a team-high 3.5 sacks and 4.5 tackles for loss. The SEC Defensive Lineman of the Week in Week 1 had another sack against Kentucky in what turned out to be as lopsided of a matchup as you’ll see. Kennard and Stewart turned Kentucky’s “Big Blue Wall” into a big blue gate. Eleven different South Carolina players registered at least 0.5 tackles for loss.

After seeing what the Gamecocks did up front in the first 2 weeks, the question is whether that’ll translate against LSU, which boasts a pair of first-round offensive tackle prospects in Will Campbell and Emery Jones Jr. It might be one of the best strength-on-strength matchups of the entire SEC slate in 2024.

You can bet GameDay will play that up. As it should. That might not be as “TV sexy” as an elite quarterback matchup, but any college football fan can appreciate a showdown like that.

And let’s also not dismiss the other obvious thing that South Carolina has working in its favor — how many Saturday atmospheres are better than Williams-Brice? That number isn’t as high as an outsider would think because of the aforementioned lack of success as a nationally-relevant team in the last decade. Outside of Nebraska, there might not be a more loyal fan base in college football than South Carolina’s. Sandstorm will be blasted on repeat all day in what’s sure to be an inferno of a day at Williams-Brice.

Does that mean the Gamecocks will live in the LSU backfield and pull off an upset for the second consecutive week? Not necessarily. We know that South Carolina’s offensive identity is very much a work in progress ahead of LaNorris Sellers’ third career start. It’s far too early to suggest that the Gamecocks’ offense will dominate like a vintage Spurrier attack or crumble like a vintage Will Muschamp unit.

All Saturday’s College GameDay return means is that South Carolina has hope in the form of its identity. We just saw it translate on the road as a double-digit underdog. When you can get after the quarterback in this pass-heavy era, it elevates your ceiling. Time will tell if that means South Carolina can start and finish the season with that identity as one of the SEC’s better teams. While the late-season upsets have been there during the Beamer era, that hasn’t happened in the post-Spurrier era. Saturday could be a monumental step in that direction.

South Carolina earned that overdue visit from GameDay — it can earn a whole lot more with a statement against LSU.