The South Carolina Gamecocks were plagued with offensive inconsistencies from the start of it's historic 30-24 victory over the Texas A&M Aggies.
The Gamecocks began the game with a 100-yard kickoff return by senior wide receiver Xavier Legette. Junior kicker Mitch Jeter made a 23-yard field goal on the next offensive series. The next time the offense saw the field, graduate running back Christian Beal-Smith added another 7 points to the score, making it 17-0 just over five minutes into the game.
The early lead can be attributed to a fast start from both the special teams and the defense, which set up or scored all of the points, rather than the offense.
“It was weird because we didn’t get into a rhythm until three drives, so once we got going, I felt like we did a lot of great things in the first half — we kept shooting ourselves in the foot,” redshirt junior quarterback Spencer Rattler said. “Got a first down, got a penalty, then we got a penalty … just things like that."
South Carolina did not score again until the third quarter, going over 36 minutes — including the entire second quarter — without putting points on the board.
“It was ugly as all get out for us there a lot of the time, but just really, really proud of our players and their fight and the individual plays that a lot of our guys made,” head coach Shane Beamer said.
To end the first half, sophomore running back Juju McDowell fumbled the ball on the South Carolina 29-yard line and give away a field goal which brought the team’s lead down to 11.
The Gamecocks proceeded to punt the ball away on its next three consecutive drives until redshirt sophomore running back MarShawn Lloyd ended the drought by scoring with an 18-yard rushing touchdown.
“Once we got the ball back from our defense…the offense pretty much just said, we put our foot down and we knew we would get down there," Lloyd said.
However, the tides turned once again on the following possession when late in the third quarter, Rattler was sacked and fumbled the ball on the first play of the drive. This turnover cost the team a touchdown and dwindled the Gamecock lead from 17 to three points.
The Gamecocks punted the next two drives and held on with 24 points until there were just over three minutes left in the game.
South Carolina marched the ball down the field in an 80-yard series that ended with Lloyd scoring on a 4-yard rushing touchdown to bring the Gamecocks to 30 points. The extra-point attempt by Jeter was blocked, adding another inconsistency to the list.
Rattler described the final scoring drive as "probably" the best of the season so far for the Gamecocks.
"Our mindset there was let's go eighty yards and go score," Rattler said. "We knew we needed to take time off the clock, we knew we needed to make another statement and put the game to bed."
Throughout the inconsistent offense, it’s worth noting Rattler did not throw any interceptions for just the second time this season with South Carolina.
“We got grit … we just never quit, we keep fighting and you know that’s what we’re about,” Rattler said. “Obviously we got things to clean up but one thing about us is we won’t quit and we’ll come out and keep punching.