Right now, Muschamp is planning on playing football this fall, but understands there’s going to have to be some lead up to it before teams can safely step between the lines at Williams-Brice.

With teams not able to practice right now due to the COVID-19 pandemic, players are tasked with working out on their own, which means they’re not getting the same level of training they would on campus.

Because of that, Muschamp thinks a two-month period before the season would be insanely beneficial before starting games.

“I think it’ll take a minimum of eight weeks to get ready: a month to get in shape and a month of practice in order to prepare the right way and keep the student athlete healthy.”

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If things didn’t get shut down, the Gamecocks would be done with spring practice and entering spring workouts with new strength and conditioning coach Paul Jackson for the next few weeks before the end of the semester.

Those, though, were shutdown and players now have to workout individually with a little help from Jackson.

“Paul Jackson is giving his guys a lot of ideas whether they have access to weights or don’t have access to weights to workout at home so they’re staying in shape as best they can during this time,” Muschamp said.

That poses a little problem with different guys having different weight room set ups at home or little to no access to weights away from campus.

Because of that, Jackson is giving them a few tips to try and get a little work done before they’re ultimately allowed back on campus.

The coaches, though, can only communicate and ask players about their workouts without the ability to monitor it.

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“We can’t really monitor anything they’re doing physically at home. We can only suggest things they can do,” Muschamp said. “We’re talking to our guys every day to see they’re working out the best they can. If they have access to weights, workout situ or they don’t, they can do some body weight stuff at home. Some guys are doing the best they can do with what they got. That’s all we can ask right now.”

Players are getting creative with it, finding different ways to get their workouts in this April before hopefully getting back to campus soon.

“Vershon Lee sent me a video of him pushing a car, which I thought was pretty good. We used to do that when I was in high school,” Muschamp said. “That’s good for our linemen. At the end of the day you got to push some weight. If you don’t have access to weights, to get behind a car and push the car—of course have someone driving and put it in neutral—I think that would be very beneficial for all our guys. It gets a good burn on the legs.”

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South Carolina has suspended all in-person instruction through the end of July, which means August is really the earliest teams can get together.

If they give Muschamp the desired two months, that means the earliest things could start would be in October.