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Scott has followed Gamecock sports for more than 30 years and provides commentary from a fan perspective. His columns appear on GamecockCentral.com each Monday during football season and other times throughout the year.
Can I be honest? I’m not used to this feeling.
You know the drill: South Carolina’s playing a brand of “OK, but not great” football. It’s getting late. The score’s close against a favored opponent. Despite some sluggishness and some early miscues by the Gamecocks, the game still surprisingly hangs in the balance. You want to allow yourself to hope. You want to believe. There’s a single word, bubbling up in your heart as a question, and you can’t tamp it down no matter how hard you try: Upset?
But there’s that fierce, pesky “130-year history of Gamecock football” thing rattling around your brain.
So you find yourself hoping and doubting simultaneously as your internal organs begin a slow collapse. You get it. I know you get it.
That’s the weird place I found myself in during the fourth quarter of South Carolina-Auburn on Saturday. The Gamecocks clung to an eight-point lead in the game’s waning moments, but I couldn’t find a way to dial down the emotional storm inside my chest. And apparently, my inner turmoil was noticeable.
“You are really just a ray of sunshine,” my wife finally said, glaring from the den chair next to mine where we were watching the broadcast. Long pause, then, “You need some valium.”
Alrighty then.
I guess I’m out of practice watching us lead games against teams ranked in the Top 15 (especially teams the Gamecocks haven’t beaten since the Great Depression). I’d prided myself on watching the first three games of the 2020 season with upbeat verve, like a supportive soccer mom cheering on the kiddos come what may.
But something was becoming increasingly clear the longer the fourth quarter lasted: I really, really wanted to beat the Auburn Tigers. Gone was my mask of stoic reserve, my flimsy façade of cheerful support. I was not Zen. Nothing was Zen.
It didn’t help that Auburn quarterback Bo Nix was inhabiting one of my least favorite roles that an opposing quarterback can play, the role of The Guy Who Isn’t Even Playing Well, But Suddenly Can’t Be Tackled Under Any Circumstances and Has Instantly Become More Slippery Than a Wet Bar of Soap.
As the clock ticked away, Nix kept squirming out of tackles, rambling around the field and inching the Tigers closer and closer to the goal line in what could potentially be a game-tying touchdown as time expired.
And then, weirdly, the game ended. And the scoreboard said South Carolina had won. But we’ll get to that.
First, how did we even get to this point, this moment where the Gamecocks had a perennial thorn-in-the-side program on the ropes?
Picks.
Lots of picks.
The Gamecocks pulled down three interceptions against Nix and Auburn on Saturday, two of them by the world-beating Jaycee Horn, all of them crucial.
Those picks were the difference in winning and losing.
And those picks may be just what we needed to fix a drifting program.
Pick Fix? Let’s allow ourselves to hope, shall we?
The Purell Hand Sanitizer Game Balls of the Week
Superlatives, shout-outs and salutations go to the following:
JAYCEE M__________G HORN! – Horn had quietly and steadily become one of the SEC’s best defensive backs in his first two years with South Carolina, and had already become one of those “We’re Just Not Throwing Over to His Side of the Field for Any Reason” guys in the secondary. You always want one of those guys on your team. But until Saturday, he’d never actually recorded an interception as a Gamecock (in part because opposing quarterbacks tend to shy away from him). That statistic is now history after he grabbed two picks against Nix (Nix Picks?) Saturday, including one that he returned, in a blur, to the eight-yard line to set up a game-altering SC touchdown. Fun side note: I live just minutes from Horn’s alma mater of Alpharetta High School, which for some reason has always made me sort of pretend to have a personal connection to Horn’s excellence, which makes absolutely no sense because I’ve never actually met the young man. Whatever. I was struck by the similarities between this upset and last year’s shocker against Georgia: Both featured lots of Gamecock interceptions (with the fireworks provided by Israel Mukuamu in 2019), a mediocre-to-struggling South Carolina offensive performance, and an unexpected win against a longtime nemesis. I’m not sure I want to win games like this for the rest of my life, but I’ll take it today.
Kevin Harris, Deshaun Fenwick and South Carolina Being Steady in the Running Game for the First Time Since Steve Spurrier Coached the Team – After the Gamecock offense failed to get much of anything going in the first half, the running back combo of Kevin Harris and a suddenly potent Deshaun Fenwick kept the chains moving in the second stanza, providing just enough offense to keep Auburn off the field and secure the points for a win. Harris picked up two more touchdowns and had another long TD run called back on a holding penalty. All I know is that this is the most confident I’ve felt in the South Carolina running game since the long-gone days of Marcus Lattimore and Mike Davis.
Shi Smith’s Absurd One-Handed 32-Yard Reception As He Fell to the Ground That Was the Kind of Play That Caused Auburn Fans to Look at One Another and Say, “You Know What? We’re Just Not Going to Win This Football Game, Are We?” – Did any of us realize Smith was ready to be this dominant at receiver? Serving as a solid Number Two to Bryan Edwards the last few years, Smith gave us plenty of reasons to expect good things coming into the season. But he’s become a worthy heir to the long line of dominant SEC receivers at USC, now firmly part of the recent legacy encompassing Rice and Alshon and Deebo and Edwards. His leaping grab of a jump-ball in the fourth quarter – which he tipped to himself and pulled in while falling to the ground – was the kind of backbreaking play that other teams always seem to make in the waning moments to turn the tide against South Carolina. This time, one of our guys was making that play. Like I told you, I’m not used to this feeling. Shi’s final numbers: 8 catches, 76 yards, a TD, and 117 trash-talks against an Auburn defensive backfield that kept trying and failing to get in his head.
Will Muschamp’s Exuberant “We Won This Game In Tuesday!” Postgame Locker Room Celebration – Say what you will about Will Muschamp, but his “Celebratory Postgame Locker Room Speech” game is very strong. He’s had some nice locker room moments in Gamecock wins against Tennessee, Florida and Georgia in years past, but I’m not sure any of them will stand the test of time quite like his “LEAVE NO DOUBT!” monologue after the Auburn game. Take a look and enjoy https://southcarolina.rivals.com/news/watch-gamecocks-locker-room-celebration.
Finally Putting to Rest That Ridiculous and Inconceivable “South Carolina Hasn’t Beaten Auburn Since They Joined the SEC Three Decades Ago” Thing – My God, I was tired of hearing about this (and we can now slot “South Carolina Hasn’t Beaten Texas A&M Since the Aggies Joined the SEC” into this category of ridiculous streaks that are threatening my mental state). I don’t think I realized how much this has been bothering me until it was officially vanquished. Shout-out to the ESPN announcing crew for mentioning that the Gamecocks hadn’t beaten Auburn since the 1930s at least 270 separate times during the broadcast. Also, thanks to ESPN sideline reporter Holly Rowe for talking about how much “this win will mean” to Will Muschamp (who was Auburn’s defensive coordinator) and USC defensive coordinator Travaris Robinson (who graduated from Auburn) when there were still three minutes left to play in the game and Auburn was driving to attempt to tie the game.
Deflated Balls
South Carolina’s Non-Shi Smith Passing Game Is Becoming an Emergency – South Carolina threw for a paltry 144 yards on Saturday (they had just 297 total yards of offense). That’s usually going to help you lock up an “L” on most weeks…unless your defense intercepts three passes and you have Shi Smith to carry the burden of your entire passing game.
The Gamecocks’ Maddening Inability to Tackle Bo Nix in the Fourth Quarter – Nix runs the ball well at quarterback, but he morphed into a terrifying combo of Michael Vick and Randall Cunningham in the closing minutes of the game. I can’t even talk about this without breaking out in hives.
The CBS Halftime Crew Inexplicably and Repeatedly Referring to Jaycee Horn’s Interception as a “Pick-Six” Even as They Were Showing Footage of the Interception, Which Was Clearly Not a Pick-Six – Not sure why this drove me as crazy as it did, and maybe I need to take a week off from watching football, but I almost lost my mind watching the CBS halftime show during the Georgia-Alabama broadcast, when the crew kept babbling about “all the great pick-sixes” that happened during the games that day, including Horn’s interceptions – neither of which was a pick-six. CBS studio analyst Brian Jones screamed about Horn’s amazing pick-six as the highlights showed Horn being tackled at the eight-yard-line. As those highlights ended, his teammate Rick Neuheisel jumped in, yelling, “DID SOMEBODY SAY PICK-SIX???” Yikes on yikes on yikes.
The Weird Way the Game Ended – When the Gamecocks win a thrilling upset, I’m accustomed to there being some kind of transcendent moment when the win is officially locked up and I burst from my chair pumping fists, breakdancing and screaming like a four-year-old on a playground. Remember last year against Georgia in overtime, when Bulldog kicker Rodrigo Blankenship’s field goal try drifted wide and the Gamecock sidelines erupted in euphoria? Let’s watch it again just to be sure https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyEluNpSfYc. Now THAT’S what a Transcendent Moment in a Victory should feel like. On Saturday, the tension kept building and building as Auburn pushed the ball towards the end zone in hopes of tying the game, but catharsis never arrived. The Gamecocks harassed Nix into flinging the ball towards No Man’s Land in what first appeared it might have been a fumble. Then the officials and players stood around for a long stretch while the crew reviewed the footage. It was ruled intentional grounding. But wait…then we needed to check to make sure the clock was where it should be. Then, fourth down, Nix scrambling, running forever, he’s sacked…and that’s it, right? Wrong. Penalty flag. Hang on. The flag was thrown where you’d usually see offensive holding, so I am feeling myself allow my hope to surge, but not so fast…is that ref signaling a personal foul? Hands to the face? That couldn’t possibly be against us, could it? Nope, it’s Auburn, and…I guess that’s the ballgame? Players and coaches walking onto the field? Yeah, it’s over. OK, good. Instead of bursting from my chair pumping fists and breakdancing at game’s end, I wound up lying partially on my chair and partially on the floor in some weird half-fetal position/half-yoga pose thing, and I never really recovered. In general, it felt like that fourth quarter lasted six hours.
Speaking of six, there were no pick-sixes by South Carolina on Saturday.
But a Pick Fix?
Maybe. Just maybe.
Let me know how you survived that ending by writing me at scottdavis@gamecockcentral.com.
