The moment was ripe for the taking for South Carolina.

The Gamecocks, fresh off a 23-point drubbing over Florida—a signature win in Shane Beamer’s first season at the helm—they went to Missouri to play a team struggling against the run with a banged up quarterback.

Needing a win to secure bowl eligibility for the first time in three seasons and off their best performance of the year, South Carolina turned in another inconsistent performance marred with sputtering stretches offensively.

“Just too inconsistent in the second and third quarter. Just sloppy football; I thought we had a really good week of practice and thought the mindset was really good throughout the week,” Beamer said. “We looked like a good team tonight and at times looked like a team that had been patting themselves on the back all week. That’s disappointing and starts with me as the head football coach.”

The Gamecocks tried to make a comeback—scoring the final 10 points of the game—but the performance in the middle part of the game set the Gamecocks back.

It’s then Missouri saw the Gamecocks tie things up and then balloon its lead to 17 points thanks to a Jason Brown strip sack turned into a Missouri fumble and an offense that sputtered as it tried to get back into the game.

Over the course of the second and third quarters South Carolina was outscored 24-7, outgained 247-80 as South Carolina rushed for minus-14 yards and allowed Missouri to rush for 83 and throw for 164.

Things began to spiral offensively after the Gamecocks—poised to take a two touchdown lead in the first quarter on the road—fumbled on Missouri’s 17-yard line and the Tigers taking it down the field for a score, essentially a 14-point swing.

After that, the Gamecocks scored just seven more points before their flurry in the fourth quarter.

“I think we just have to believe all the way through,” Jason Brown said. “I think when we got down we got down on ourselves. We just have to believe on ourselves all the way through that we can win the game in any situation we’re in. we have to continue to fight."

South Carolina defensively, after shutting down a potent rushing attack last week against Florida, gave up over 5.5 yards per carry and couldn’t stop Missouri’s Tyler Badie at all, especially in crunch time.

Badie had 57 yards on Missouri’s game-icing drive and ended with 209 yards and averaged 6.1 yards per pop.

“It was very frustrating. We had high expectations, like we do every week going into games, especially coming off the win last week,” Brad Johnson said. “At the end of the day, we just didn’t get the job done. We have to be sharper with our run fits. One of our emphases this week was gang tackling and getting to the ball. We ran to the ball but had to finish those plays and finis those tackles.”

The things South Carolina did against Florida to pull the upset—protecting the ball, limiting penalties and tackling well—regressed as the Gamecocks turned it over three times, leading to 14 Missouri points, had five penalties for 35 yards and couldn’t limit gains.

Now, with two games left, they’ll have to beat either Auburn or Clemson to avoid three straight seasons without a postseason appearance.

“Just have to tackle better, simple as that,” Cam Smith said. “Those are two yard gains turning into five or six. On first or second down, you’re really not going to have success on third down if you’re getting in second and six or second and fours.”

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