SOUTH CAROLINA GAMECOCKS FOOTBALL

Spring practice and fall camp may receive the media attention, but the less talked about days in the Columbia summer heat, with no coaches or coverage around, are equally as important.

Summer weight room work, be it lifting or conditioning -- really anything without an actual football -- is organized by the strength staff throughout the offseason. But it's on the players themselves to put together their summer practices involving the ball.

The player-run practices, or PRPs, offer an additional offseason opportunity to improve.

"It's where you really pull your leadership from," head coach Will Muschamp said. "In every exit meeting with every player, we talk about the things they need to improve on themselves individually, which collectively helps us as a football team. That's a time for them to really work on those sort of things. Obviously, everybody can continue to learn our scheme on offense or defense better and they can do that during those player-run practices."

The workouts are usually organized by the team's veterans with quarterback Jake Bentley helping head up the activities. Senior linebacker T.J. Brunson, among others, will also likely be heavily involved.

While there are heavy NCAA limitations on coaches' involvement, thus the player-run aspect, those players can still report back to their coaches on what they've seen.

"It's interesting to hear, especially when they evaluate our younger players as far as how those guys fit in," Muschamp said. "Players know. They know the guys that belong. Whether they're ready mentally or not, sometimes they don't know, but physically they're able to see the guys that know that they belong as far as to help our football team."

Bentley said this spring that the team would throw two times a week in June and then ramp up to three times per week in July leading into fall camp. The workouts are not padded and often involve a lot of 1-on-1 or 7-on-7 action. Those days are in addition to the weight room work that the team will complete throughout the summer.

"It's a critical, critical, vital part of having a really good football team in the fall," Muschamp added. "As I've said before in some of these Gamecock Club meetings, there's a lot to like about our team right now, we've got to really improve over the months of May, June and July."