The South Carolina defense is hoping history won’t repeat itself against the Kentucky running backs when they face at Williams-Brice Stadium on Saturday.
The Gamecocks have lost three straight meetings with the Wildcats, including last season’s matchup in Lexington in which running back Stanley “Boom” Williams amassed 123 rushing yards and one touchdown.
While Williams opted for the NFL Draft after three seasons, the Wildcats still possess talented sophomore running rack Benny Snell, who had a “breakout” game against the Gamecocks in 2016, according to linebacker Bryson Allen-Williams.
“He’s a big back, and he runs really hard,” Allen-Williams said. “He had a real good game. Like I said, we’ve just got to continue to play. If we take care of us, I feel like we can go out and play against anybody and do well against anybody on defense.”
The 5-foot-11, 223-pound Snell ran for 103 yards on 19 carries against Eastern Kentucky in Week 2 this season, scoring one touchdown and recording his longest rush at 25 yards.
Alongside Snell is another Kentucky rushing weapon: junior Sihiem King, who is coming off a 61-yard performance against Eastern Kentucky. While Snell is known for his aggressive, high-impact rushing style, King offers a different, more sporadic approach, according to South Carolina head coach Will Muschamp.
“They really committed to the run last year, really against us probably,” Muschamp said. “Benny Snell is an outstanding back – tough, hard-nosed, runs north and south, gets positive yards, rarely takes negative plays. Sihiem King is a guy who’s a change-of-pace guy, somewhat like they had last year with some other guys. He’s done a really nice job.”
Utilizing three backs -- Snell, Williams and Jojo Kemp — the Kentucky offense racked up 216 rushing yards and two rushing touchdowns against the USC defense last season. The longest rush of that game was delivered by Williams, who dodged a tackle from Chris Moody to rush 43 yards into the end zone and give the Wildcats a 10-7 lead in the third quarter. Snell scored the winning touchdown with a 1-yard rush in the fourth quarter, shedding a tackle from D.J. Smith and slowly trotting into the endzone.
This season, Muschamp and his staff are confident the fundamental defensive issues, including tackling, have been fixed.
“Number one, fundamentally, we’re much better off in hand placement, pad level, a lot of those things,” Muschamp said. “I think they’ve got a good offensive line. They blocked us in some situations. They created some one-on-ones. We missed some tackles. We had one on their sideline and several late in the game, as far as keeping drives alive in those situations.
"I think fundamentally, we needed improvement. I think we have improved.”
Allen-Williams, a senior who has yet to beat Kentucky in his tenure at USC, echoed his head coach’s sentiment.
“I think we’re a totally different team compared to last year,” Allen-Williams said. “We’re way more physical up front. We actually talk about, together as a defense, I feel like we’ve got an understanding of what coach Muschamp wants. We go out and execute so we just got to continue to keep rolling and just to continue to stay humble and hungry.”