ORLANDO, Fla. — Few have run the gambit of a college football career more than Vershon Lee.
South Carolina’s fifth-year senior on the offensive line has started games at right tackle, left guard and center in his career. In a dire situation after Josiah Thompson suffered an injury on the final drive at Clemson, he kicked out to left tackle. He has protected six different quarterbacks, played under three different offensive line coaches, stuck around through a head coaching change and finished seasons with regular season win totals ranging from two to nine.
And now, this is the end of the road. South Carolina’s starting center will make his 51st and final appearance for the Gamecocks in the Citrus Bowl against Illinois, a journey so twisting and winding even he can’t believe it.
“I've thought about this last game for a while now,” Lee said. “Every practice that comes up is my last practice with the Gamecocks. I've thought about that.”
As a program, this bowl game marks the end of a chapter for South Carolina football. Not only for the 2024 season, a significant turnaround from a 5-7 campaign to an opportunity for just the fifth 10-win season in program history, but for Shane Beamer as the first group of seniors who was with him the entirety of his tenure departs.
The 2021 arrivals, the ones who bought into a first time head coach and signed letters of intent to play for a program coming off a 2-8 year, have been around four seasons. For a select group of guys like Lee, they played under Will Muschamp in 2020, received that year of eligibility back due to the coronavirus pandemic and still stuck around for a full four seasons with Beamer.
It feels like a springboard for the future of the program, the definition of leaving a place better than you found it. Even for a team full of players who stuck it out and grinded their way to a better future, nobody epitomizes it more than Lee.
He’s played every position, done everything asked of him and more and been a stabilizing force for a program in transition.
Day in, day out, always there.
“It’s been a great process,” right guard Torricelli Simpkins III said. “This has been a great journey with my guy V-Lee. He’s taught me a lot, we’ve taught each other a lot. We feed off each other’s energy. He’s been my roommate all season as well, so I’ve definitely gotten closer to him as a person, as a teammate and as a brother as well.”
This season, the world around Lee has changed. The guards on both sides are transfers, and he is snapping the ball to a new quarterback in LaNorris Sellers. Like everything else thrown at him in Columbia, he has taken it in stride.
Help the young players, establish a connection with the new ones, and continue to grow. For a freshman quarterback stepping in with enormous expectations, Sellers could not have had a better battery mate.
“It was smoother than I thought it would be,” Sellers said about working with his new center. “ I knew him from last year and talked to a lot of the guys about him. We built on last year, and now we’re close.”
Finally, this is it. When South Carolina takes the field for its 2025 season opener against Virginia Tech, it will be the first time in almost six calendar years it will do so without Lee on the roster. In an era of college football where everything is year-to-year and players sticking around even four years is rare — and astronomical with a head coaching change in the middle — Lee’s five years are almost a relic for the sport.
Defensive tackle Alex Huntley — another fifth-year senior — estimates he’s had over 100,000 reps against Lee across his career in practices.
“It's cool to see your teammate but also one of your best friends grow as a player and as a man,” Huntely said. “It's been real cool. That's my brother. I'm going to miss it.”
Everyone else is going to miss him, too.
************************************************************************
Looking to continue the conversation? Join us on the insider's forum to talk all things South Carolina football
