SOUTH CAROLINA
Jake Bentley had a historically good performance on the road at Clemson on Saturday. If you missed it, the junior Gamecock signal caller torched the Tigers’ defense for 510 passing yards and five touchdowns in South Carolina’s 56-35 loss to the No. 2 team in the nation.
According to his head coach, Will Muschamp, Bentley’s performance was the first time in SEC history that a conference QB threw for 500 yards against a top 5 team.
Pretty impressive. However, according to the SEC, not impressive enough to win SEC Offensive Player of the Week honors — which was an honor split between Alabama QB Tua Tagovailoa and Vanderbilt QB Kyle Shurmur. The Crimson Tide QB threw for 324 yards and five touchdowns, he also added a rushing score, which gave him an Alabama single-game record six touchdowns against Auburn. The Commodore QB completed 31 of his 35 passes for 367 yards and three touchdowns against Tennessee to help lead Vandy to a bowl berth.
While those players had impressive performances over the weekend, Muschamp clearly took issue with the SEC’s decision to honor those two players and not Bentley during his Tuesday press conference.
“I do think it’s important, when a young man does some special things, to get recognized for it,” Muschamp said on Tuesday. “He is the first quarterback in Southeastern Conference history to throw for that many yards against a top 5 team and five touchdowns. In the history of the league. Never been done before! That’s pretty impressive, in my opinion.
“I’ve been in this league a long time, I have learned, we have a saying, ‘It just means more.’ It just means more sometimes, depending on what your logo is. Call it like it is. Next question.”
Later in the press conference, Muschamp was asked about the possibility of Bentley leaving school early for the NFL. That’s not a topic the South Carolina coach wished to discuss at this time but did offer up this comment.
“He’s a junior, we play Akron on Saturday,” Muschamp stated. “That’s what we are worried about now.”
South Carolina will finish the regular season at home this Saturday against Akron, looking to win the team’s seventh game of the season.
Shame on the SEC and Vandy…
All that matters is that I know and recognize it. Because I am. The supreme being of college football.
Muschamp will always find something to cry about. #snowflake
Aren’t you guys 0-100 against him..
Don’t hear me crying about it. We’ve been bad for the last decade. TN just has to do better.
Muschamp is no snowflake, played Safety at Georgia & have you seen his wife?
Lol, a Vol fan calling someone snowflake, it doesn’t get more soft than a vol fan, thanks for the laugh
You really think they respect Vandy’s logo more than USC’s?
Has the SEC ever awarded an offensive player from a losing team? I’m honestly curious as that might explain it. At the same time, who won OPotW from week 7 last season? Can you remember without looking it up or have you forgotten? I bet no one that knows or saw what Bentley did to that defense is going to forget it though.
Muschamp has a good point. And, btw, the award isn’t “Offensive Player of the Week…in a Victory” and doing what he did against a Clemson defense outranks ANYTHING done to an Auburn or Tennessee defense.
I don’t know… I think people were more looking at how Clempson’s defense is over-hyped. ACC is WAY down this year and South Carolina was the first team to really play them that has a pulse. The only way Clempson wins a game in the NC playoff is if they play Notre Dame. (Who they should be playing in the ACC CG instead of Pittsburgh)