Gamecocks tweaking practice plan in Coronavirus age
If the first full slate of college football taught the sports-loving world anything it’s that this year is going to be one of the more unique in college football history.
You can read that and say, ‘Well, duh, of course it is, we’re playing in the middle of a pandemic and challenges are going to happen.’
But the level to which the pandemic can affect football game in and game out were shown last Saturday when Georgia Southern had 33 players inactive with either positive tests, contact tracing, suspensions or coach’s discretion.
Because of the volatility in when a positive test can come, Will Muschamp and the Gamecocks are changing the way they practice this year.
“You have to do more good on good work because you have to prepare and develop the middle and bottom half of your roster that way guys get quality looks in practice,” Muschamp said.
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In a typical game week, South Carolina will have a Sunday cleanup practice then three full practices Tuesday through Thursday an a walk-through Friday before the game Saturday.
Those practices are usually filled with the first or second team players on the depth chart going against the scout team, a collection of guys there to mimic South Carolina’s next opponent.
This year, like it is with almost everything in the world, scout team will look a little different with defensive coordinator Travaris Robinson saying they’ll rotate different players on scout team during the week so everyone gets reps in practice.
Because a positive test could come late in the week and maybe rule out three or four more guys behind it with contact tracing protocols, the Gamecocks are trying to get more players quality reps in practice.
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“One of the things we have to do a good job of is keeping guys up and having a ready call list for guys that aren’t playing a bunch of defense but might have to play a bunch of defense,” coordinator Travaris Robinson said. “We could get a bad result on a test on Friday with some contact tracing behind it and lose a couple of guys going into a ballgame and have to have staples of your defense.”
The Gamecocks will also do more of what Muschamp calls “good on good work” as the team begins Tennessee preparations Thursday with the first team offense or defense going against its second team counterpart.
Typically that’s reserved for training camp, but with the Gamecocks needing to get a lot of players work, it’s something that will need to be done during the season.
Offensive coordinator Mike Bobo even mentioned two-spotting a lot of things, which means having the first team offense and second team defense on one field and the second team offense with the first team defense on another to try and cram as many reps into the 20 hours coaches are given.
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“I said look, even if you’re a starter we can’t rep every single look at full speed. We can’t rep it. And I'm daggum sure we can’t rep every player getting every rep,” Bobo said. “You have to lock in and pay attention and listen when you’re not going or we won’t be able to do the things we need to on offense. It’s not the old days where you’re going to have two runs and that’s it.”
