Spring practice is over and South Carolina’s season opener against Coastal Carolina is still over four months away. Even with the long offseason ahead for the Gamecocks and 129 other schools, ESPN released its first Football Power Index (FPI) rankings for the 2018 football season.
According to ESPN, the FPI is a way to measure team strength to predict a team’s performance going forward for the season. This system uses results from 10,000 computer simulations to predict how all Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams will perform.
In the latest results, the FPI predicts that South Carolina will finish the season with 7.2 wins and 4.8 losses.
This comes as a surprise to many Gamecock fans, especially after South Carolina exceeded expectations in 2017 with a 9-4 record and an Outback Bowl victory on Jan. 1. In addition, the tempo that was put on display during the team’s spring game makes this early prediction even more surprising.
After watching the spring game, it was easy to see how much more offensive firepower this team is capable of. Head coach Will Muschamp and starting quarterback Jake Bentley noticed this change after the spring game on March 31.
“Very pleased with how our guys have received [the offense],” Muschamp said after the spring game. “It’s been good for our entire organization … I thought we dictated the tempo well.”
Bentley, who is coming off a season where he threw for 2,794 yards with 18 touchdowns and 12 interceptions, will be playing under new offensive coordinator Bryan McClendon. With McClendon on staff, the offense will have a more up-tempo game.
“I think we did a lot of good things,” Bentley said after the spring game. “The tempo … is a big advantage that we have.”
It is also worth mentioning that Deebo Samuel, who suffered a knee injury against Kentucky last season, did not play in the spring game. He was explosive in all three of the games he played in last year, highlighted by kickoff returns against N.C. State and Missouri.
On the defensive side of the ball, seven defensive players from last year have graduated, meaning that there is some youth on that side of the ball.
However, there are players such as Bryson Allen-Williams that are returning this season. Paired with the defensive staff and Muschamp’s history of developing defensive players, the losses are still not enough to justify only seven wins.
The schedule also sets up well for the Gamecocks, especially when compared to previous years. The Gamecocks, as they do every year, play the six other teams in the SEC East. They also have Ole Miss and Texas A&M from the SEC West, while drawing Coastal Carolina, Marshall and Clemson in the non-conference matchups.
Georgia and Clemson, who both were in the College Football Playoff last season, present obvious challenges. However, the other 10 teams are beatable with the talent that the Gamecocks now have. Florida, Tennessee, Ole Miss and Texas A&M are all in the midst of coaching changes, making those teams less daunting than they once were.
With the players that are returning, the new style of play that the team has shown and a more favorable schedule, there are a lot of reasons to think that the Gamecocks can build off of last year’s success.
While it might be premature for South Carolina to be seen as a College Football Playoff team, there is no reason for fans to believe that this year’s team will win less games than it did in 2017.
With the current roster and schedule, another nine win season and a New Year’s Day bowl game is much more realistic than a seven win season like ESPN’s FPI suggests.