South Carolina football: Stinging loss sends Will Muschamp back to drawing board
Make no mistake about it, this was a crushing loss for Will Muschamp.
He set the table for the season as this being the best — and deepest — team he had fielded in his fourth season as South Carolina’s head coach.
But on Saturday the Gamecocks fell against North Carolina, an 11-point underdog which was 2-9 last year and has a first-year coach and true freshman quarterback.
“We just need to go back and evaluate our team at all positions right now,” Muschamp said afterward, responding to a question about quarterback changes.
Perhaps most troubling is that two known issues, run defense and quarterback inconsistency, remained at the top of the list of problems for Muschamp and his staff to address.
For a defensive-minded coach, the way the Gamecocks allowed North Carolina to come back from a 20-9 fourth-quarter deficit has to be especially troubling. When South Carolina’s Kyle Markway scored a touchdown, it seemed like he grabbed the momentum for the Gamecocks and settled the volatile tight end position in one scoring drive.
But in response the Tar Heels registered scoring drives of 98 and 95 yards, and the second one came after Muschamp went the conservative route and chose to punt near midfield instead of going for it on fourth down.
Muschamp is routinely candid in his personal assessment, and he didn’t shy away from the mistake this time.
“I felt confident about our defense coming into this game and making some stops,” he said. “I felt comfortable about our defense, and obviously, I was wrong.”
North Carolina gained 483 yards, but did most of its damage on the ground, rushing for 238 yards (4.6 per carry. That came in contrast to South Carolina’s 270 yards of total offense.
“They are patient in their runs and we cut back and over-pursued,” Muschamp said. He also added that he was “extremely disappointed with the tackling and lack of tackling.”
Gamecocks quarterback Jake Bentley had a change to change the narrative about him entering the fourth quarter. But instead, he went 2-of-9 for 15 yards and two interceptions in the quarter and finished 16-of-30 for 142 yards. When Bentley’s team needed him the most he couldn’t come through, which has happened often in recent years.
The players struggled with execution, but there are plenty of questions about the coaching decisions and play-calling because South Carolina has a lot of offensive weapons. Bryan Edwards left in the first half with an injury, but returned and only had one catch in the game. Is this the kind of offense Muschamp had in mind when he replaced Kurt Roper with Bryan McClendon as offensive coordinator?
“Our offense, we moved the ball well in the first half,” Muschamp said. “We have to go back and look at the second half and see what we were doing wrong.”
That’s because they had just 42 offensive yards after taking a 20-9 lead.
The Gamecocks face Charleston Southern next week, so there are realistically two weeks ahead for the Gamecocks to quell the hand-wringing in the locker room and around the program. Because they will need an entirely different effort on Sept. 14 when Alabama visits Columbia.
Go back and re-evaluate the team?! You had 2 months to do that! Oh my word…we’re into 15 million to buy out his stupid contract so I guess we have to suffer through this now over the next 4 seasons. The offense is totally lost…the run defense is no better than last year and Bentley is exactly the same!
Man and the USCjr fans didn’t believe us UF fans. We told you Muschamp isn’t the answer at head coach and Bentley isn’t that good of a QB luckily USCjr has some talent I think with a good hire it could get turned around quick. If they let Mischamp go after the season that is
The huge red flag was when Texas didn’t make him head coach. Shame on Muschump at Florida…shame on us for hiring him. We’ve spent about 100 million on facilities and increased salaries over the last 4 years and this is what we get…a big pile of CRAP!
I do think USC is fixable with the right coaching hire though. I could easily see a Mullen year 1 type turn around for USCjr if you hire the right guy
Mullen year 1 turnaround?
LOL. So delusional.
Can’t afford to fire him. The brain child for AD gave them all big contract extensions and raises.Very expensive buyout from what I hear. Should have waited until he proved himself first. Not sold on Mullen either, hearing about lots of problem down in Fla. They would be better with Mason or Stoops from KY. You know, coaches that do more with less.
Corch you’re a moron. Taking a four win team to a ten win team NY6 bowl win and beating your instate rival isn’t a turnaround. I can’t understand how you are so stupid. It literally baffles me
Will Mushchamp was named the “Head Coach In Waiting” at Texas. He chose to leave to become the head coach of Florida a year or two before Mack Brown was let go at Texas. Texas most definitely would have made him head coach had he stuck around.
I remember as well. I doubt the outcome at Texas would have been a significant change from that of Florida or USC if he had stayed a Longhorn.
They hired Coach Boom, then they must have made him take Prozac. Turn Boom lose if he’s going to lose his job let him lose it his way!!! Then Fire Ray Tanner he needs to sell the Gamecock Program to the point you shouldn’t have to call people, they should be calling you.
Tanner put the muzzle on Boom, Dawn Staley, and Frank Martin. All three are firey passionate coaches but Tanners wants baseball style coaching in these take no prisoner sports. The underlying problem continues to be Ray Tanner.
Being exclusively loyal to the Bentley’s have screwed Muschump and us up. No other QB has been given a real opportunity to play since they arrived on the scene. The damage has been done.
If the guy can’t make the plays, sit him down. That’s what normally happens in competitive sports but not with Chump.
Time to show him the door.
Muschamp has been a head coach for several years now and still hasn’t learned that you can’t be too conservative with a small lead in the 2nd half. Poor Jake Bentley has regressed every year.
What a waste of a hire. If you recall, the WHOLE nation lit up chat board with Ben Affleck-Batman hired type laughable memes! To sum it up in a few words, newbie Athletic Director Ray Tanner took CliffNotes (ie, read Wikipedia coach bios) on how to hire a coach. And Muschamp was bargain-basement “you-gotta-start-somewhere” material. As I stated last summer, if we were a mid-tier program or better? He would’ve been fired after the bowl game lose last year!