When South Carolina takes the practice field Tuesday morning, it will be arguably the most pivotal week offensively since the season started.

The Gamecocks are in the middle of an in-season quarterback competition with three players aiming to win the starting job before kickoff Saturday against Ole Miss.

Competition is centering on starter Collin Hill, last year’s starter Ryan Hilinski and Luke Doty with all three having different strengths and weaknesses at various points in their career.

Collin Hill (graduate transfer, 376 snaps at South Carolina)

The case for: Hill’s struggled lately but does have a very high understanding of Mike Bobo’s offense. That probably causes a few stomachs to turn reading it, but a lot of that knowledge is intangible.

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Hill gets into the offense into right looks in the run game, which until Saturday night had been one of the best in the SEC. Keeping him as the starter would mean Hill did enough in practice to show the last two games were the exception and not the rule.

The case against: This could very well just be a copy and paste of his statistics from his last two games—20-for-43, 300 yards, one touchdown and three picks—but we’ll expand a little bit.

Hill hasn’t gotten a lot of help from his receivers and line, but he’s looked at best pedestrian the last two weeks. He’s struggled stretching the ball vertically and completing passes consistently.

The offense is also coming off its worst performance of the Will Muschamp era and needs some sort of spark to get it going. If Hill doesn’t start, then it’s cause Hilinski or Doty gives South Carolina that.

Ryan Hilinski (sophomore, 745 snaps at South Carolina)

The case for: Simple enough, he’s the backup quarterback and if Hill isn’t cutting it, he’s the next in line. Hilinski was middle of the road as a freshman last season—58.1 completion percentage, 5.8 yards per attempt, 11 touchdowns and five interceptions—but played the majority of that banged up.

The optimist would say a healthy former four-star quarterback who already took his licks in the league should be much improved and know what to expect more.

Hilinski didn’t win the starting job this preseason with the staff citing knowledge of the playbook and some fundamental issues, and if he wins the job it means he’s grown exponentially there since the season started.

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The case against: Hilinski already went head to head with Hill this preseason and lost the job. He also doesn’t give the Gamecocks anything new in terms of skill set; he’s still a pocket passer who has struggled in his time at South Carolina to extend plays with his feet.

His freshman season stats weren’t great and he doesn’t have bailout Bryan Edwards to throw to anymore. Plus, are you also going to throw out another pocket passer with an offensive line struggling to protect the quarterback?

Luke Doty (freshman, 15 snaps at South Carolina)

The case for: You seen that hair? That’s SEC-level hair. In all seriousness, though, Doty is a top 100 player, a four-star recruit and one of the best dual-threat quarterbacks in the country coming out with the 2020 class.

He offers a different dimension to the game compared to Hill and Hilinski with his ability to run, scramble and extend plays. If he can be as good of a passer as the other two, the offense could look a lot different.

He’s been almost exclusively quarterback for the last month or so, Muschamp said, and if he gets the job, then it’s because he’s too talented to not see the field and has done enough in his practice snaps to make the coaches and teammates think he can spark an offense.

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Doty is a true freshman and could be the future of the position, so why not toss him out there and see what you have if you’re Bobo and Muschamp? If there’s any week to trot out a true freshman, it’s against a bad defense like Ole Miss’s.

The case against: You’re really going to trot out a true freshman with limited snaps against a SEC defense, albeit a bad one, and hope for success?

Doty is talented but is inexperienced. There’s one thing to come in for a play or two but there’s a level of experience needed to play 50-plus snaps at quarterback and very few freshmen do it and do it well.