Admittedly, even with the game going on, Shane Beamer thought about it a few times Luke Doty reared back and fired the ball to one of the tight ends.
With four-star tight end target Oscar Delp in the crowd Saturday night against Troy, there was an oddly increased emphasis—coincidentally enough— on getting the tight end group more targets.
"We want to spotlight our best players, how about that," Beamer said, cracking a smile and referencing the social media hashtag WeWantDelp that developed this summer.
Beamer joked having certain visitors in the stands doesn't necessarily dictate who gets the ball more, but mentioned he did think about it a time or two as well and the tight ends really did have an increased role Saturday in a 23-14 win.
Coming into the game tonight the tight end position had only been targeted 16 times and brought in 11 receptions.
During the Troy game alone, Doty targeted all three tight ends listed on the depth chart tonight 11 total times.
Even though he didn't directly say that Delp being in attendance effected the game plan against Troy, he did say that it crossed his mind.
"I did think of that during the game a couple times when Nick and Jaheim caught a couple balls for sure," Beamer said. "Can't lie and tell you I wasn't thinking about it."
Nick Muse, Jaheim Bell and EJ Jenkins were able to bring in a combined 96 receiving yards and one touchdown courtesy of Jenkins, a 16-yard catch and run.
"It's something that we always do I mean our tight ends are weapons and we want to find ways to get them the ball," Beamer said. "We felt really good about the match ups today against Troy and we're trying to target those guys, that was solely because we're trying to win a football game."
Regardless of it was intentional, the game tonight continued to prove that the tight end room is filled with talented players.
"I think we did a good job of getting our tight ends in play a little bit more, getting them some balls out in the flat, down the field," Doty said. "Just showing what we can really do on offense, making a statement and I felt like we did that this afternoon and into the night."
Doty was much more blunt than Beamer was in terms of what the tight ends performance meant for the recruitment of Delp.
"I would think that kinda puts it on display for him, just the type of things that were able to do with those guys because they are so versatile," Doty said. "They're athletes too so we're pretty happy with their performance and the way they competed so we're just going to keep finding ways to get them the ball and have them go make plays for us."
Delp likely noticed the increase of tight end production tonight and even if the coaching staff told him watch for it or not, Josh Vann said that the recruits notice things like that.
When he was a recruit Vann said he made sure to pay attention the the wide receivers while he was on his visits.
"I was personally looking at my position, just to see the guys that they had at the schools and see like 'ok I can go in there and do, if not, better than that receiver," Vann said.
South Carolina is one Delp's top four schools and he plans to announce his commitment on October 13. Beamer and company will hope to continue to highlight the tight ends in the game plan until then in hopes of landing the big time recruitment.
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