Good luck trying to figure out this year’s South Carolina football team. Here’s a couple grades after the Gamecocks’ loss to Mizzou on Saturday:

OFFENSE: C-

Nine punts and faulty execution with several drops. Average. South Carolina nearly escaped an anemic offensive performance with a ‘W’ but it wasn’t to be after the Gamecocks’ final three-and-out before their desperation drive did very little to help a defense gassed from exhaustion. In need of a chain-mover clinging to a 20-14 lead late in the fourth quarter, Dylan Thompson’s 2-yard out to Rory Anderson on 3rd-and-12 was a microcosm of South Carolina’s struggles. The Gamecocks punted and Mizzou marched 51 yards in nine plays for the victory. South Carolina ran 79 plays, but managed just 338 yards and went 0-2 on fourth down. Perhaps an anomaly, Thompson and the rest of his teammates were out of sync throughout.

DEFENSE: B

It’s hard to justify anything better here due to how the game ended, but South Carolina did have its best defensive performance of the season, by far. Held well below his season average, the Gamecocks hounded Mizzou’s Maty Mauk and limited one of the SEC’s top passers to just 132 yards on a 12-for-34 effort. Mauk was the league’s leader in touchdown passes coming in with 14, but a secondary ranked near the bottom of college football shined. The Tigers managed nearly half of their offensive total over the final 7:25 of the contest. Improvement was shown, but South Carolina didn’t close.

SPECIAL TEAMS: B

Mizzou’s Marcus Murphy managed 19.5 yards per touch on special teams, but he was held out of the end zone. South Carolina’s Tyler Hull placed four of his career-high nine punts inside the 20 and Elliott Fry made both of his field goal attempts.

COACHING: D+

Steve Spurrier’s worst game of the season included a questionable fourth-down decision in the first quarter and several head-scratching ‘ball plays’ on third down. The choice to take the PAT with 7:25 remaining instead of trying for the two-point conversion wasn’t great, either. For the most part, Mizzou took away South Carolina’s deep ball and forced underneath routes that never amounted to much. Thompson never established a rhythm with so many three-and-outs and Spurrier’s use of Pharoh Cooper in the Wildcat didn’t seem to fit the flow of the game.

OVERALL: C

The facts are quite simple: South Carolina’s had the look of a seven or eight-win team throughout the season and isn’t going to simply overpower the competition on both sides of the ball this season. Expectations need to be tempered a bit now that the coaching staff’s had five games worth of sample size to notice that there are issues — like unpredictable offensive line play, an immobile quarterback and secondary problems — that aren’t going away. The main item to watch over the next few weeks will be this team’s confidence level and whether Spurrier can convince his players there’s a season still worth salvaging.