Will Muschamp continues to face questions regarding South Carolina's delayed pace on offense
Will Muschamp finished the 2019 season under significant pressure from the South Carolina fan base after going 4-8, and that pressure has not lightened up through the first two games of 2020.
South Carolina fell to Tennessee 31-27 in Week 1 and lost 38-24 to Florida in Week 2. In both of those games, Muschamp has faced criticism for the way he managed the clock late in games while trailing. Against Tennessee, it was the decision to go for a field goal that cut the Vols’ lead to four with over three minutes left, rather than go for a touchdown to tie it up.
Against Florida, it was the lack of urgency on the Gamecocks’ final drive that ate up the remainder of the fourth quarter clock while still down 14 points. South Carolina had the ball down two scores with under eight minutes to play and needed to score quickly, but an 18-play, 74-yard drive used over seven minutes of game clock and finished with a turnover on downs with 48 seconds left.
“I don’t know that it’s the play call, it’s just the operation needs to be faster,” said Muschamp. “And I said that when the game was over, we needed to be crisper in our operation, and we needed to be quicker to the line.
“When you’re in my shoes and you get to the three-minute mark and you got two timeouts left and you’re below three minutes, you’re going to have to onside kick unless you score quickly. If it’s below two and a half minutes there’s no conversation, you have to, because they’re going to run between 44 and 48 seconds off.”
Any time a head coach spends back-to-back weeks of media availability explaining his reasoning in late-game situations, it’s probably not a good sign for that program. Muschamp was continually critical of his offense’s tempo late in the game, led by first-year offensive coordinator Mike Bobo.
“We needed to have a quicker operation after we converted the fourth down, the fourth and four,” Muschamp added. “And we converted that, we needed to speed up. I believe I’ve said that, and that’s what we needed to do.”
Although he may not be in danger of being fired at the moment, Muschamp badly needs a win to quell his critics. A sluggish performance against SEC bottom-feeder Vanderbilt in Week 3 certainly would not help him in that effort.
There is no excuse he can give that is going to be good enough. Just awful.
Awful. He is pathetic.
Obviously I am rooting for USC to be terrible but why did they hire Muschamp again? Florida had a drastically better roster and he had what, 1 above average season there? Why would he succeed at USC, a team that was under .500 until Spurrier?
I certainly think someone can win at USC, in terms of winning 8+ most years and occasionally winning the division. USC has won and competed in men’s and women’s basketball, along with baseball. Spurrier had back to back to back 11 win seasons. That should not be viewed as their floor but at this point that is not Muschamp’s ceiling either. I think they are 1-7 in their last eight games.
I say keep him forever, just like I want Auburn to keep Gus, but at some point they have to get rid of the guy.
He was a panic hire imo. Context was a bunch of jobs came open in 2015, I think it was 20 something. Hot names were Justin Fuente, Tom Herman, and Kirby Smart. Tom Herman played them into getting a better deal out of Houston. It was thought they had a legit shot at Smart but then GA booted Richt.
With that said though the process was botched. Spurrier quit mid season yet they didn’t use the head start to their advantage over the other programs. Rich Rodriguez was interviewed. On purpose. He announced he was turning down the job, even though it was never offered to him. Bad look for Tanner and SC. So they missed on the thought to be up and comers and then began looking to retreads after the plan to have no plan (no obvious one anyhow) fell apart.
So do you have confidence in them doing any better now or at the end of the season? Who’s out that that would take that job now? Serious question. Sometimes teams and programs need to just realize who they are and accept it. Challenge Vandy and Missouri, beat UK and UT once or twice a decade and focus your efforts elsewhere.
The only names I’ve heard from BOT insiders are Napier, Beamer and Satterfield.
Nobody that jumps out as a “WOW” hire like Urban Meyer but most fans would take anyone over Muschimp.
No confidence in football nor the AD right now.
There’s always a coach somewhere looking to move up. Finding someone to take the job is not a problem, finding the right dude is.
I’m assuming since you asked a serious question the rest about “accepting who you are” is too. No. just no to that. Accepting mediocrity by the decision makers and many fans (increasingly less on this one) is why this program is the way it is. Spurrier saw that right away, he eventually showed you can win more as many of us believed could be done. Your suggestions of what “accepting who you are” looks like are just wrong. As bad as SC football is, to do those things is a step backwards. In their time in the SEC they have winning records against the first three and since 2005 (Spurrier arrival) they are 8-8 against UT.
In short Tanner did a terrible effing job and Muschamp, the bum, was the only coach left.
Tanner is an idiot also. That is why Will is even here.
It sounds like the only thing that crossed Muschamp’s mind in the final 5 minutes of the game was to do an on-side kick if they score. Brilliant.
Idiot. There are simply no other words.