On Saturday the Texas A&M Aggies return to Columbia and Williams-Brice Stadium for the first time since August 28, 2014. As a South Carolina fan two years ago, everything leading up to that game and that day felt big time. And it felt big time not because of the opponent, but because of who we were.

The Gamecocks were coming off of a third straight 11-win season, a number 4 final national ranking the previous season, and a top 10 ranking at the beginning of 2014. We had five straight wins over our hated rival, who weren’t too shabby themselves. We had a coach who was the toast of college football, a man who had taken a moribund program and turned them into an SEC powerhouse. There was even a Steve Spurrier documentary the night before on the newly launched SEC Network, a groundbreaking new venture for the conference and for ESPN.

The game against the Aggies was the first ever on the new network, and it was a showcase for the University of South Carolina football program. We had a fresh new park adjacent to the stadium, new brick pathways, and an 80-foot idol hanging from the walls of Williams-Brice stadium honoring the man who had made us great.

August 28, 2014 was to be a coronation for South Carolina football, the new kid on the block who planned to be there for many years to come. We were a force to be reckoned with, and we had an 18-game home winning streak to prove it.

Then the game started.

It wasn’t the first drive that was so disturbing. While you’d rather not give up a 9-play touchdown drive to start a game, it wasn’t something to be terribly alarmed about. But when it kept happening, and happening, and happening again…

We were down 31-14 at the half on the way to a 52-28 beat down. The numbers for TAMU were staggering – 680 total yards of offense, 511 passing by some guy named Kenny Hill. They carved us up like they were playing against air.

When the clock hit all zeroes that night, it wasn’t just the end of a bad loss for USC, it was the end of something much larger. It was the end of our relevance on the college football scene. We didn’t realize it at the time, but our program had been rotting from the inside for months. Poor recruiting, poor coaching and coaching hires, and a general laziness around the football office left us the ashes we’re still sweeping up today.

Will we be relevant again? Someday, sure, I think we will. But we have a long way to go, and having the Texas A&M Aggies roll into town this weekend just reminds me of how fast and how far we’ve fallen. I think we can probably expect a similar result this weekend as we had two years ago.

Funny, though, I look at that final score and think, damn, what I wouldn’t give to score 28 points.

EMERGENCY MEETING. Thank you everyone for meeting here on the flight deck on such short notice. We have an announcement to make and simply felt like it was best to tell you all in person, and as soon as possible. There’s no easy way to say this, so we’ll just come right out with it – we have slipped into a black hole.

This does not come as a surprise to many of you, as you can clearly see that we have been completely surrounded by darkness since our battle last night with the Starship Kentucky. The SS KY will be entering the black hole shortly, their entrance only delayed by having the good fortune of having to battle us instead of a more formidable opponent.

Rest assured, Admiral Muschamp is well aware of the situation and is doing everything in his power to get us out of here. By “everything in his power” I mean he is currently sobbing uncontrollably in his quarters, but I’m sure he’ll pull it together shortly and figure out something to do. I guess. In the meantime, Captain Roper is working feverishly to get the main engines back into working order. He is randomly pushing buttons on the control panel but so far none seem to work. On a related note, we would like to immediately assemble a team of volunteers to assist Captain Roper in finding the keys to the ship. He has lost both the primary and his back-up set.

Listen, we know this is a difficult time for everyone, but we must remain calm and stick together. We have no idea how long it could take to get out of here. It could be years. Some of you won’t make it, but those who do will be better people because of it. I read that on the internet somewhere so I think it’s probably true.

Understand that our former leader, Admiral Spurrier, left us in a very difficult position. Before he left in his escape pod twelve months ago, for some unknown reason, he smashed many of our instrument panels and ripped critical wiring out of our systems. Very strange that he would do that since he helped build most of it. Most odd was that when he left he took ALL of the quilted two-ply toilet tissue with him. Weird dude.

Regardless, you’ve adjusted to using office paper instead of toilet tissue, so I believe you can adjust to living in this black hole for a while. My advice is to try to find other things to occupy your time while on our disabled ship, like your family or maybe a hobby. Make the most of your time here, and start by focusing on the good things in your life, and not this crappy, broken down old bucket of bolts.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m getting word that Admiral Muschamp has requested a ream of office paper.

Offensive. South Carolina once again managed to make a bad defense look good. In their first three games, Kentucky had given up 44 points/520 yards, 45 points/564 yards, and 42 points/500 yards. The Gamecocks only managed 10 points and a measly 268 yards on ten possessions. You’re well within your right as an American to say “yeah, but” and cite our youth, new coaching staff, etc., but honestly that performance was nothing short of embarrassing.

What’s the problem? The symptoms are numerous and unfortunately most will not be fixed in 2016. It’s a porous offensive line, a dearth of playmakers, youth and inexperience at the quarterback position, and poor coaching (call it scheme, call it play calling, call it whatever you want, it all rolls up to the offensive staff).

The first thing can be fixed. Players can play better, players can be coached up, or players can be replaced with other players who can do a better job. With the offensive line situation at least there can be hope.

The second and third things cannot. Fixing the offensive line would help to a degree, but the fact is we do not have guys who are dynamic with the ball in their hands, can outrun defenders or make defenders miss. Bryan Edwards is the closest thing we have, but he is young and doesn’t have a QB who can get the ball to him consistently. Everyone else who touches the ball on offense has proven to be average at best. Recruiting can fix this, and hopefully will fix this as soon as next season. But unless we have a miracle breakout by someone we’re in for a long season.

The final thing – coaching – can be debated until the cows come home. I don’t know if Kurt Roper is any good or not. His history with offenses everywhere but Florida suggests he can be a good OC. But what we saw with the Gators and what we’ve seen so far this year has given cause for concern. Will better players make Roper a better coach? I hope we get to find out.

Punt Boom Punt. Will Muschamp continued his terribly frustrating habit of punting the ball in plus territory in fourth and short situations. He did it four more times last night (FOUR, in TEN possessions). The final time was on 4th and 2 with about eight minutes left, right after back breaking 11-play drive by the Wildcats that put them up by a touchdown. We did stop them and got the ball back with one last chance to win, but it was simply the wrong call. With an offense as anemic as ours, we cannot afford to give possessions away when we get into enemy territory and only need a couple of yards to keep a drive alive.

Modern English. Darius English had three sacks last night, the most by one Gamecock in a  game since Jadeveon Clowney had 4.5 against Clemson in 2012. While his pass rushing skills were excellent, he was pushed around on Kentucky’s game winning drive that featured eleven straight running plays and brought back memories of JoJo Kemp’s 2014 performance against USC.

Nun-YES. I’m getting more puzzled by the day that, given our lack of playmakers on offense, that Lorenzo Nuñez is being held out in hopes of redshirting him. I’m also becoming increasingly puzzled that he was ever moved from quarterback in the first place. I like Brandon McIlwain, and I think he’s going to be a fine QB for us for a long time, but frankly his running skills are not nearly as dynamic as I expected.

Nuñez is bigger, stronger and faster than McIlwain, and proved last year he can make things happen with the ball in his hands. All I’m asking is for a few touches per game. Straight QB runs, screen passes, hell even line him up a tailback. Just give him the ball and let him work.

Hunker down. The easiest part of our schedule is behind us, and we’re 2-2 against teams that are below average (Mississippi State) to bad (Vandy, ECU, Kentucky). I think you know what that makes us.

Five of the eight teams left on our schedule are currently in the Top 25. At least two of them will probably be in the top 10 when we play them. Sitting here today there appear to be two winnable games left on our schedule, and anything beyond that will take a Herculean effort.

To borrow a phrase from one of our hated rivals, you better hunker down, it’s looking like a long season.

Some not so quick, barely researched, not fully-formed thoughts from South Carolina’s 20-15 win over East Carolina:

Fast starters. Last week we lamented the fact that South Carolina had extremely slow starts in the first two games of the season. Against East Carolina we had quite the opposite, scoring 17 points in the first seven minutes of the game. It was fun to watch, but if you were like me you knew this game wasn’t going to be that easy.

Not only was it not easy, the Gamecocks only crossed midfield two more times the entire game (not counting the possession following the late ECU onside kick) and generated three points on an Elliott Fry field goal. There was questionable play calling along the way by Kurt Roper, some more terrible offensive line play, and the inexperience and inconsistency of freshman QB Brandon McIlwain contributed to many a stalled drive. Fortunately this is a very young team, as you’ll see below, and there are flashes of talent. Hopefully reps and consistency will eventually get this offense where it needs to be.

Bent but not broken. We’ve never seen a Gamecock defense make as much luck for themselves as they did with their backs against the wall on Saturday. ECU shredded the USC defense all game, consistently moving the ball with ease into the red zone. But a combination of bad decisions by the Pirates and great plays by the Gamecocks helped keep ECU out of the end zone until late.

First, in the second quarter, the Gamecocks stuffed East Carolina on second down from the one yard line, then Jamarcus King came up with a clutch interception on third down. Next, in the third quarter Chris Lammons intercepted Phillip Nelson at the one yard line to end another threat. The third time the Pirates were knocking on the door, Antoine Wilder jarred the ball loose from ECU running back Anthony Scott and DJ Smith recovered the ball in the end zone.

Throw in a blocked 25-yard field goal by Ulric Jones and that was FOUR trips inside the USC ten yard line that resulted in zero points for the Pirates. That’s a minimum of 12 points and a maximum of 28 points that East Carolina missed out on, both totals that could have won them the game.

But it didn’t, and while that’s all well and good for one Saturday this fall, we cannot afford to let other teams sprint up and down the field on us. The odds are against them making the same mistakes.

McIl-WIN. The main fan fodder of the fall was not if Brandon McIlwain would take over as the Gamecocks’ full-time quarterback, but when. Will Muschamp gave B-Mac the opportunity on Saturday, and at least for the first three series he didn’t disappoint. The rest of the game the offense sputtered mightily, and as stated above it was a combination of factors that contributed.

My biggest fear going in was that McIlwain would not go through his progressions on pass plays and pull the ball down and run too much. Turns out he didn’t bail out too early at all that I can remember, and there were times I wish he would have. More curious was the fact that he didn’t have more designed runs called. I’m not sure if that can be attributed to play calls that forced him to hand off, or that he made bad reads on the option, or something else. (I do feel like he’s better on the edge than in the pocket, we’ll see if Roper sees the same thing.)

Basically I guess what I’m saying now is there is a sweet spot in between my fear of him running too much and my fear of him not running enough. I’m not sure what that is, but I think I’ll know it when I see it. How’s that for hard-hitting analysis?

Lies, damned lies and statistics. These numbers in favor of East Carolina are staggering:

First downs: 34-13

Total yards: 519-212

Time of possession: 38:25-21:35

That tells me they dragged us all over the field. But one statistic was their undoing – four turnovers to the Gamecocks’ zero.

Records are made to be broken…against USC. East Carolina wide receiver Zay Jones continued a tradition of players having spectacular games against the Gamecocks, catching 22 passes (TWENTY-TWO) in the game Saturday, one shy of tying an NCAA record. It was obviously an ECU record, though, and if you’re a college football player who has South Carolina on your schedule you might be in for a very special day.

Kurt-ains. Kurt Roper called a pretty weird game on Saturday, starting our strong but then never getting his offense into any type of rhythm after that. He did put the game away late, however, on 4^th and 1 with a speed option to David Williams, his best call to date at USC.

Back running. Speaking of David Williams, it was good to see him back in the lineup running hard on Saturday, picking up 67 yards on seven carries. I’m once again hopeful his troubles (whatever they are) are behind him and he can become our main man at tailback.

Youth movement. Rob Profitt (@BreakinDownFilm) had a great tweet about the contribution of South Carolina’s freshmen on Saturday:

Corner kicks. Yes, we gave up a lot of yards passing on Saturday, but I’ve been encouraged by the play of cornerbacks Chris Lammons and Jamarcus King so far this season. Hopefully we can play more of the press coverage we’ve been hearing so much more about as they get more experience.

Officially terrible. The officiating wasn’t horrible from start to finish in my opinion, but the AAC crew assigned to our game had three of the worst calls/no calls I’ve seen recently. They completely missed a false start on the ECU defense late, they missed an obvious pass interference against Darius English on ECU’s 2-point attempt, and then they had this gem of a pass interference call:

Go Cocks.

Here are a few nuggets after watching copious amounts of football over the last four days. Keep in mind, one game is the smallest possible sample size you can have for every team, so I reserve the right to change my mind over the course of the season. I will also humbly admit where I was wrong as the season progresses (ha, fat chance).

Bama is still the king. The first weekend of the college football season is the absolute worst predictor of how a team will be long-term. Teams are still working out their depth chart, coaches are getting a feel for new players, many times new systems are being implemented. Even veteran squads like the Clemson offense are not immune to first game struggles. First games are scary.

But this Alabama team looked like a well-oiled machine against Southern Cal on Saturday. They were predictably dominant on the line of scrimmage and their defense was what you would expect of a ‘Bama defense. However, the addition of Jalen Hurts gives the Tide a weapon the likes of which they haven’t had in a long time, and maybe ever. If Alabama can win a National Title with a cigar store Indian like Jake Coker at the helm, then Hurts might make them one of the dominant teams of this decade. Everyone else could be playing for second place.

Houston is legit. One of the contenders is definitely going to be Houston. As bad as I hate to admit it, Tom Herman is going to have this team in the college football playoff come season’s end. They are far and away the most talented G5 team ever, and the way they manhandled Oklahoma has everyone taking notice. They only have one real test on their schedule the rest of the way – Louisville on November 11. If they can keep from stumbling they’ll finish top 4.

Nick Chubb is the next Herschel Walker (finally). Georgia seemingly brings in “the next Herschel Walker” every other year. Many have come in with lofty expectations – Sanks, Crowell, Ealey, King – but none have come close to matching the exploits of the great #34. Until now.

Nick Chubb is the leader in the Heisman Trophy race after week 1. He had 222 yards and two touchdowns on 32 carries against North Carolina. That’s a fantastic stat line for somebody who didn’t have their knee gruesomely shredded 11 months ago. But having numbers like that after the injury he suffered is almost not human. Chubb is cut from a different cloth, and I will not be the least bit surprised if  he’s hoisting the Heisman in December.

Gus Malzahn has forgotten how to coach. You sometimes hear people say “well it’s not like he forgot how to coach” when responding to criticism of a team’s head man. But with Malzahn you have to wonder. Three years ago he was the toast of college football with his innovative hurry up no huddle offense. But last night against Clemson he not only rotated three quarterbacks (bad idea) but he rotated them within series and sometimes within sets of downs (worse idea). His entire offensive philosophy has made no sense for the last season + one game. A lot of it has to do with the fact he doesn’t have a quarterback he trusts, but at some point he has to ride or die with one person.

Dan Mullen missed his window. Mullen has taken Mississippi State to its greatest heights as a program. He was a hot coaching candidate for several years, and was mentioned in connection with multiple jobs better than MSU (sorry Bulldogs). Whether he didn’t want those jobs or was never considered, he now looks like he’ll be at State for a while trying to rebuild that program. I don’t think any big programs are going to be knocking down his door for his services.

LSU should’ve fired Les Miles. LSU was shamed into keeping Les Miles last winter. Miles had so much public sentiment on his side he didn’t have to make any significant changes to his staff, and that’s a shame because Cam Cameron is bringing LSU down from the inside. Miles has had a great run at Baton Rouge, but they have underperformed and underachieved long enough now that they are going to have to make a change.

The SEC is mostly mediocre. Outside of Alabama, are you confident there is a top 10 team in the SEC? I think this season could see all of the middle-of-the-packers beating up on each other and you’ll have a slew of teams between 6-6 and 8-4. Does this  mean the SEC is down? Compared to 3-4 years ago, it sure does.

(To  the left is our “Is the SEC butt?” ratings after one week.)

The ACC is a 3-team race. Most think it is a two-team race between Clemson and Florida State. But Louisville is primed for a run at the title under Bobby Petrino. The talent there is better than it has ever been, and Lamar Jackson is the closest thing to Michael Vick we have seen since Michael Vick.

Two and three-quarterback systems will be a short-lived fad. I’ve seen more quarterbacks used in this first week than at any time I can ever remember. I think over the long haul that’s a very bad idea, and I expect by week three or four you’ll see the majority of teams settle on one QB except for possible short-yardage packages.

Team to watch. Oklahoma State.

Player to watch. The aforementioned Lamar Jackson.

Texas is back? As I’m typing this Texas is down to Notre Dame 35-31 in the fourth quarter. But the Longhorn offense has looked excellent under freshman QB Shane Buechele. This makes me happy for Charlie Strong, who is a solid dude and a good coach.

Boom. Congratulations to Will Muschamp on his first win as South Carolina head coach. It was not a beautiful game to watch, but the final result was supermodel hot to Gamecock fans. This team has the potential to be very frustrating, but they showed last night they have tremendous fight in them. In a game where practically nothing was going their way, they stayed within striking distance with a suffocating defense and then finally found a rhythm on offense when it mattered most. It wasn’t pretty, but I don’t think many will be this year. A win is a win is a win, especially a game in conference and on the road.

Anti-Spurrier. Will Muschamp got his first win as South Carolina head coach last night, and while the game looked like some early Spurrier-era games, the coaching style is surely something different. Spurrier was terribly impatient with his offense, and was willing to gamble on that side of the ball even at the risk of putting his defense in a bad situation.

Last night, Muschamp ran out his punter on three straight occasions while in plus territory before halftime on Thursday. The thinking? Pin Vandy deep, force a three and out and get the ball back with good field position. Essentially you trade a three and out by them for a new set of downs for you. It’s a conservative, old school philosophy that is hard to argue with when it works. And two of the three times it did work, except for the part where we go down and score points.

It is also a philosophy that is widely panned in this day and age of high-powered offensive football. Indeed it was widely panned by the guy sitting in section V, row 70, seat 27 last night (that was me btw). But that philosophy preserved field position and helped prevent a momentum shift at a time when the game could have easily slipped away from us. So in that regard, it worked. But it doesn’t mean I have to  like it.

Frysman. What can you say about Elliott Fry. The dude came in as a nobody four years ago and won the starting placekicker job. He has been a steady presence in our special teams ever since. Sure, he’s missed a few along the way, but from inside 40 you never get that “oh god I can’t watch” feeling.

Beyond 40 has been a little bit of an adventure at times, and before his game-winning 55-yarder last night he was only 2 of 8 on attempts of more than 50 yards in his career. But he stepped up and drilled that kick with room to spare in a clutch moment which might turn out to be the defining moment of his USC career.

A Star is Born. People took notice of Bryan Edwards this fall when a photo and then an accompanying video surfaced of him making a twisting, one-handed grab in practice. “Oh boy,” we thought, “maybe this guy is going to be good.”

Turns out this guy is good. In a crowded field of young, inexperienced wide receivers, Edwards last night established himself as the go-to guy with an 8 catch, 101-yard performance against Vanderbilt. He showed it all last night – ability to go up and get the jump ball, ability to make defenders miss, and strength that means it’s going to be very difficult for one man to bring him down. He goes after the ball like it’s his most prized possession and somebody is trying to steal it.

Now that we’ve established that, if we can get some consistency out of Deebo Samuel and have someone step up in the slot (Jamari Smith does not look like the answer) then this receiving corps has a chance to be pretty good.

Turner the Burner. Another freshman (RS), AJ Turner, was a revelation last night. Eyebrows were raised when he was elevated to the number one running back spot, but against the Commodores he showed why. Turner finished with 13 carries for 70 yards, including a critical 20-yarder that set up USC’s lone touchdown. He was shifty and at times powerful despite his lack of ideal size. He looks like the main man at the tailback spot.

Meanwhile, David Williams continues to be an enigma, finishing with 5 carries for 7 yards. In his defense, he had no running lanes when given the opportunity. But then again, that seems to be a common theme in his career.

Orthquake. During halftime Gman asked me where I thought  would go at quarterback in the second half. My answer was Brandon McIlwain was going to go the rest of the way, and was probably going to be the man going forward. I even went so far as to say if another QB came in not named McIlwain it would probably be Jake Bentley.

I had Perry Orth dead and buried, and was shoveling dirt on him when he ran out to start the second half. He then proceeded to do what he does when he’s good – manage the game, make good decisions and put his throws in the right places. (His deep, over the shoulder, third down throw to Deebo was as pretty a ball as you will ever see.)

We have these shiny new freshman quarterbacks we desperately want to take over. But they’re just not ready. Athletically they’re both superior to Orth, but Orth right now is still a better quarterback. We may not WANT Perry Orth to be our QB, but we NEED him to be our QB. He delivered when we needed him the most.

Defensive. No stars emerged on defense last night, but as a unit Travaris Robinson’s squad played a solid game. Now let’s not get crazy, Vanderbilt is bad to very bad on offense, so the jury will remain out for at least another week. But compared to what we saw under the Hoke/Ward plan, it was a damn good start.

Special. Aside from one critical Deebo Samuel fumbled punt, the special teams play was very good.

Out the window. Conventional statistical wisdom says there are certain things you have to do to win a football game, such as win time of possession, limit penalties and win the turnover battle. We did none of those things last night, but that’s cool, we won where it mattered most.

Still, let’s get that corrected shall we?

Home field disadvantage. Five minutes prior to kickoff I tweeted out a picture of a mostly empty Vanderbilt Stadium. The Gamecock fans easily outnumbered the Commodore fans. But to their credit the Vandy fans eventually showed up, even though they still only outnumbered the Carolina fans by a 60-40 margin.

Ah, yes, August. When the boys of fall gather to prepare for a new season of our favorite sport. Pads and helmets cracking, crushed tires getting stuck in the shoes of players and coaches, junior college coaches challenging referees to fights, repetitive practice reports.

And over the last few years, the continuation of The War on Jadeveon Clowney.

I came across this article today on The Ringer entitled The One-Hit Wonder, with the sub-head Have We Already Seen the Best of Jadeveon Clowney?

The post is mostly fair, wondering if Clowney will ever develop into the most dominant defender in the NFL that seemed to be his destiny a few short years ago. And I must admit,  each passing practice session or exhibition game or regular season game where I read “Clowney will not suit up” or “Clowney inactive” allows more doubt to creep into my Clowney-loving mind that maybe he never will live up to his billing. But more often than not the reports and responses to Clowney’s injury misfortune slip into mean-spirited hot takes – he’s lazy, he has no work ethic, he’s a bum. Now we’re even starting to see the ugliest word that can be attributed to a first-round draft pick be bandied about – BUST.

But the attacks on Clowney started before the Houston Texans made him the number one overall pick in the 2014 NFL Draft. After a spectacular sophomore season at South Carolina, someone floated the idea that Clowney should consider skipping his junior season and start preparing for the draft as the presumptive first pick. Even though Clowney flatly stated that he never even considered that as an option, somehow the idea became attached to him like a parasite. All of the sudden he was a bad teammate for considering something that he never even considered.

Then, when JD didn’t live up to the unrealistic standard we had all set for him in his junior season, he was roundly criticized by those outside of the Gamecock community. Again, he was lazy. He didn’t want to be here. He was selfish. He had poor work ethic. Never mind the fact every offense we faced designed their entire gameplan around not letting number 7 beat them. He consistently had 2-3 men blocking him. How else do you think Kelcy Quarles picked up 9.5 sacks that season?

Even after a spectacular pro day solidified his seemingly tenuous position as the number one pick, it didn’t matter. People had made up their minds, and their minds are still made up. But we’ve added another label to Clowney since he entered the NFL:  injury-prone. This label is unfortunately justified, but is completely unrelated to all the other labels that have been used to tear down Clowney over the last few years. Just ask all the coaches and trainers who have worked with JD, and they’ll tell you he has worked his ass off to get back on the field and nobody is more frustrated than he is. Bill O’Brien, head coach of the Texans, is about as no-nonsense an NFL head coach as you’ll find, and he has been very supportive of Clowney throughout his injury troubles. If Bill O’Brien thought Clowney wasn’t working hard enough to get back, I promise you you would know about it.

Most importantly there is the nature of Clowney’s most significant injury – cartilage damage that required microfracture surgery. You can read a little detail about microfracture surgery in the linked article, but basically it is a career-threatening injury and procedure. It is not career-threatening in a “never play again” sense, but in a “will never be the same” sense.

Gosder Cherilus, then playing offensive tackle for the Indianapolis Colts, had undergone and returned from microfracture surgery himself. At the time, Cherilus’s prognosis for the then-21-year-old Clowney was as succinct as it was damning: “He’s screwed.”

“Cartilage doesn’t heal. It’s one of the few tissues that doesn’t heal at all,” Gomoll said. “If you cut your skin, at least it heals with a scar. If you cut your liver, it heals with liver tissue. If you break a bone, it heals with bone. But with cartilage, for reasons we still don’t completely understand, it just doesn’t heal.”

When Marcus Lattimore suffered a career-threatening (and ultimately career-ending) knee injury, the outpouring of support and empathy was overwhelming. Nobody called him a bust when he gave up his comeback and decided to retire from the 49ers. But Jadeveon Clowney is getting crucified for his inability – so far – to return from a potentially career-threatening injury. What has Clowney done, or not done, to deserve this derision?

(Quick note: I understand how different these injuries were and how the comparison might not sit well with some. Lattimore’s injury was extremely public, and gruesome, while Clowney’s was private, and invisible to us. However, we are still talking about a career-threatening injury for JD, so the point stands.)

I want Clowney to succeed in the NFL in the worst way. I want him to prove everyone wrong. I truly believe he’s working as hard as he can to get back on the field for the Texans, but his body so far has betrayed him. If he doesn’t make it in the League I will never, ever lower myself to calling him all those names his enemies are calling him with a self-satisfied smirk on their face.

Clowney chose the University of South Carolina when he could’ve literally chosen any school in the country. He gave us some of our greatest memories during our greatest seasons. He did nothing truly worthy of ridicule while he was here, and I believe he has done nothing worthy of ridicule since he’s been in the NFL, unless you consider getting injured worthy of ridicule.

Either way, you cannot make me not love Jadeveon Clowney.

I checked Twitter after I left church yesterday to find that most “bracketologists” were leaving South Carolina out of the 2016 NCAA Tournament. This came one sleep cycle after they were still in, probably as a 10 seed, and after they had lost their quarterfinal game in the SEC Tournament against Georgia. And that came one sleep cycle after they were solidly in, not even relegated to the “last four in” column.

As the day progressed I resigned myself to the fact they were not going to make it. I still had a glimmer of hope, but that inner Gamecock defense mechanism kicked in to help dull the inevitable pain of another spring – this makes 12 in a row – without my team in the Big Dance.

It made sense after all. They lost to an awful Missouri team. They lost to a bad Mississippi State team. An average-at-best Georgia team beat them three times. Their out of conference schedule sucked even though they won every one of those games. The prosecution had a pretty good case built as to why a 24-win power five conference team shouldn’t make it.

The first bad omen came before the awful CBS Selection Show (more on that later) – Frank Martin and the team were not attending a Gamecock watch party, they were watching privately. As he stated later, he received information that “things didn’t look good”. The second bad omen was the first bracket and the first 10 seed – Temple. The Owls were consistently a “last four in” or “first four out” from what I had seen, so there went one of the Gamecocks’ spots. Then…

Vanderbilt.

What? We beat them, finished higher than them in conference, and they were beaten by an awful Tennessee team in the SEC Tournament.

Syracuse.

Double what? 19-13 with some bad losses, most people didn’t even have them on the bubble.

Tulsa.

Hold up, are we doing the NIT bracket now? This is a joke, right?

Like many of you, the anger began to swell within me. South Carolina not making the tournament for the reasons listed above is one thing, but having those three get in – two of whom we beat head to head – was not acceptable. I’m usually the last person to scream “we got screwed”, but

WE GOT SCREWED

Yes, the tough love folks are still telling me this morning “win more games” and “we have no one to blame but ourselves”. And that’s mostly right. But every bubble team or team that didn’t get as high a seed as they expected could repeat that mantra (hey, Michigan State, you want a #1 seed, then WIN MORE GAMES). The fact is we were being directly compared to other teams on the bubble that had bad losses, or maybe not enough good wins, or maybe not enough wins period. When you stack up all the data, I think there is no doubt we are one of the best 36 at-large teams in the country.

Win more games, control your own destiny and don’t leave it in the hands of the committee? Yes, of course. But when the committee ignores important things like beating the teams you were competing with for a spot in the tournament, then I think it’s fair to be at least a little pissed.

And most of us are more than a little pissed.

Frank Martin. I’m not trying to set up a straw man here because I’ve only seen one person directly pin the blame for this season’s failures on Frank Martin. But I have seen other tweets indirectly referencing such, so I want to use it as a jumping off point to talk about the job Martin has done:

If you think Frank Martin has not done a good job at South Carolina, then you are a moron.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about the good job he has done. First of all, he inherited a complete disaster from Darrin Horn, then had to deal with the transfers of two of South Carolina’s best players in Anthony Gill and Damontre Harris. He filled the roster as best he could those first two seasons and limped to 14-18 and 14-20 seasons.

Last year the team stumbled out of the gate (losses to Charlotte and Akron) but closed the out of conference slate with impressive wins over Oklahoma State, Clemson and Iowa State. A 2-8 start in conference play doomed our chances at any postseason action, but two wins in the SEC Tournament gave us a glimpse into the future.

Perhaps the biggest sin the Gamecocks and Martin committed this year was creating unrealistic expectations by darting out to a 15-0 start. For most of the season an NCAA Tournament berth seemed like a foregone conclusion. But what people forgot was the core of this team was the same as the teams that finished a combined seven games under .500 over the previous three years (24 games under .500 in conference play). We were still prone to the things that dogged us those years, mainly a lack of consistent production on the offensive end. What helped us persevere more often than not were things that don’t show up in the box score, including the experience and leadership of Sindarius Thornwell and Michael Carrera.

We are a work in progress, but Frank Martin has this program trending up. I’m confident future Selection Sundays will be just as stressful as yesterday, but for different reasons – like wondering what our seeding and region will be.

Talent. Brace yourselves because some of you are not going to like this, but this is also a testament to the job Frank Martin has done – our basketball team is not very talented. Before you get bent out of shape over that statement, I think it is a compliment to Martin and every member of the team that I can say that about a team that won 24 games in a power five conference.

Look at it this way, we have two kids on our team who were highly-ranked recruits – Thornwell and P.J. Dozier. I’d say Chris Silva was probably about a half-step below those two. I’m not a big follower of basketball recruiting, but was anyone else on our roster a big “get”? Carrera busted his ass and made himself an all-SEC performer by his senior year, but not many people wanted a skinny 6’5” post player out of high school. When you look at the rest of the roster, with few exceptions, those are guys that weren’t necessarily our first choices.

I’m saying all of this as a compliment to the players and the staff. We accomplished something quite good considering the team we had to cobble together.

That being said, if Frank Martin has had a failing at USC, it has been his inability to land more high-profile recruits, and specifically a scorer. Think about if we had any combination of Danuel House, LJ Peak and Tevin Mack, or if we had Seventh Woods or Dewan Huell coming in next year. We were a finalist for all of these guys, and they all went elsewhere.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful to have the likes of Sedee Keita, Rakym Felder and Maik Kotsar coming, but none of them appear to be program changers. We need THAT GUY. You know the one. The one that can hit a step back jumper when the game is on the line. The one who can finish strong at the rim and get an and-1 at the most critical moment.

Frank does really well with the good players. I’d love to see what he could do with the great players. We just have to land a few.

NIT. I’ll be watching every minute of every game. I want to cut down the nets in NYC. I want Carrera, Chat and Mindy to go out as the winningest team in South Carolina history. But it’s still the NIT, and if there is a celebration, it will be a muted one.

CBS. You ruined it CBS. The thirty minute Selection Show was the best 30 minutes of television of the year. But you got greedy, and that abomination of a two-hour special was unfair to the players and fans alike. Not to mention it was boring and just plain bad.

Go Cocks.

Today Will Muschamp was named the 34th head coach in the history of University of South Carolina football. Over the course of the last few weeks my thought process regarding Muschamp has gone a little something like this:

• What a ridiculous idea, but it’s not gonna happen so I’m not worried
• Holy cow he’s moved into the top 3 this is worrisome
• What do you mean all signs point to Muschamp?
• We’re really going to hire Muschamp where’s the key to the liquor cabinet

To a certain extent I was being a lemming, following the anti-Muschamp crowd crowing about what a disaster he was at Florida (and he was, that’s still valid). But adding to my dismay was the complete cluster the coaching search was (which is a story for another day), which made the hire feel that much worse.

There are two things that have us concerned. The first and most important is his tenure at Florida, where he inherited a team that had won two National Championships in the previous four years. Muschamp guided them to a very average 28-21 record over his four years, and that included an 11-2 record in 2013. He fielded top 10 defenses and pulled in top 10 recruiting classes every year he was there, but his offenses were anemic, and that ultimately led to his ouster. Sure, there were injuries, and there were problems at the quarterback position, but this was Florida, a place where it shouldn’t be hard to roll the ball on the field and win 9-10 games per year.

The other concern is his demeanor. He’s known as a guy who easily loses control of his emotions, which is not a great quality as to have as a head coach. Photos and videos of his angry face and tirades have permeated our Twitter timeline for weeks now. He was and is still the butt of jokes nationally for his failure at Florida.

But the fact is Muschamp is well-respected in the coaching community. When Gus Malzahn hired him at Auburn last year he called Muschamp “the best defensive mind in football, not just college football.” By many accounts he had several coaches and former players advocating for him to Ray Tanner. He was a coaching superstar just a few years ago, rising to head-coach-in-waiting at Texas under Mack Brown. When he was offered the Florida job it was simply too good to pass up, and he was going to be a can’t miss replacement for Urban Meyer.

Unfortunately for him, he did miss. Big time.

A little after 11 a.m. this morning my mood started to change. As Will Muschamp spoke what I saw was that coaching superstar from a few years ago at Texas. I saw a tireless worker (unlike our previous HBC) and a guy passionate and excited about his new job. I saw a man who believes recruiting is the lifeblood of college football, and you better be damn good at it. I saw somebody who knows, at the tender age of 44, that this could be his last chance to be a major college head coach.

For the first time, I saw a guy I liked. I saw a guy that I’m glad to have on my side.

I have no idea what the future holds for Will Muschamp at the University of South Carolina. He might boom, he might bust. The odds say he’ll probably fall somewhere in between.

Either way, it’s time for all of us to stop bitching (especially me) and support Will Muschamp. After all, he’s a Gamecock now.

On TRC-U 86 the boys discuss the Clemson game and welcome Sportstalk’s Phil Kornblut to the show to discuss the South Carolina coaching search. Who’s it gonna be? Is Tom Herman in play? (Probably not, but we talk about it anyway.) Will we settle for Will Muschamp? (Probably, and it’s depressing.)

We also take your Twitter questions, which are mostly about the coaching search too. WE’RE SO SICK OF THE COACHING SEARCH.

Here’s the iTunes link for you hipsters.

You can also stream here or by clicking the graphic, and enjoy!

After listening to Mark Richt speak one day after his dismissal as head coach at Georgia, there are a number of things I’d like for him to do, including but not limited to: teach my Sunday School class, be the executor of my will, come to our family Christmas dinner, accompany me on a trip to an orphanage in Kenya, have a long talk with my kids about the importance of character, and so on.

There is one thing I do not want him to do: become the head coach at the University of South Carolina.

That’s kind of hard for me to say because, as we know, Mark Richt is one of the finest people we have ever encountered in the world of college football sports life. I frequently tell my kids that at the end of your life what you did is much less important than who you were. Richt epitomizes that.

But while he would be great to have around our football program, he is still not the right head football coach for South Carolina. The reason is that it is highly doubtful he could replicate his success with the Gamecocks.

When Richt came to Georgia as a young man, the program was in disarray. They had two failed regimes after the legendary Vince Dooley retired – Ray Goff and Jim Donnan. Richt realized the potential at UGA quickly, winning the SEC Championship in 2002 and 2005, and capturing six SEC Eastern Division titles. The Bulldogs also came up one play short of playing for the National Championship in 2012.

But Richt could never break through that ceiling at Georgia and put his team among the national elite year in and year out, which in my opinion is where they belong. While he won consistently, there were mind-boggling blowout losses by teams considered to be his best. Georgia fans will argue that while he won a lot the Bulldogs always seemed to lay an egg when the stage was biggest.

Now understand, he did all of this while at the helm of a program that has no excuse to not be Alabama, or Florida, or LSU, or Auburn. In other words, teams that have national championships in recent years. Georgia is in the middle of one of the most fertile recruiting bases in the country, and they capitalize on it every year with elite recruiting classes. They have a rabid fan base, a national brand that can help pull top-ranked players from places as far away as Texas and Washington state, and practically all the resources they need to have a national championship program.

Yet, they have no national championships in 15 years under Mark Richt.

Now, let’s deal with some uncomfortable truths about the South Carolina job. We do not have a national brand. When it comes to recruiting, we typically get the leftovers that the SEC elites didn’t have room for. We have very little tradition or championships to speak of. Our brands the last 15 years have been Holtz and Spurrier, not the South Carolina Gamecocks, and we can attribute our recent successes more to our coaches than to our program’s awesomeness.

The conclusion is, if Richt couldn’t win enough at Georgia, what makes you think he could win at South Carolina? If his ceiling at Georgia was an average of 9-10 wins per year, at USC it would probably be somewhere around 7-8. Given what I wrote in the paragraph above some of you might say “sign me up”, but I’m not among that crowd.

You’re also probably asking “then who CAN get us to that next level?” I’m afraid I don’t know the answer for sure, but there’s a very short list of people I’d rather see try than Mark Richt.

For once in my life I’m advocating for the devil we don’t know, as opposed to the saint that we do.