Buck says – USC 44, Furman 13.  I had a strong feeling that we were going to beat Georgia last week, and lo and behold we did.  This week, I have a strong feeling that we’re going to take care of business against Furman.  If this team is going to prove it’s different from the other Spurrier teams that got off to strong starts, it needs to dash any hopes of a Paladin upset early, and then not let up on the gas pedal.  Look for a much more balanced offensive attack, with something much closer to a 50-50 run/pass ratio.  Lattimore will get 20 touches, but not much more.  Garcia needs to be solid and build some confidence heading into next week.  I don’t expect Furman to move the ball much against our defense.  Ellis Johnson will have those guys ready.  Don’t be surprised if we have a rough go of it in the first quarter, but we’ll get it in gear before halftime.

Tbone says – Carolina 55 Furman 17.  I guess I can bring a little Paladin perspective to this contest.  The average FU fan likes Bobby Lamb a great deal.  He’s an alum, a former starting quarterback, and loyal coach, but its clear to all that he’s no Dick Sheridan, Jimmy Satterfield, or Bobby Johnson.  He’s solid, but still a step down from those guys.  In much the same vein, this year’s edition of the Purple and White is solid, but a step down from the teams of old.  Coach Spurrier has all but stated he plans on hanging fifty on someone this year, and this is his best 2010 chance.  The first couple of series may feel awkward, and we may start asking ourselves some old familiar questions, but things will settle in pretty quick.  Oh, and my score contemplates a late Furman TD.  Now I just hope Dr. Smolla doesn’t revoke my diploma for predicting an embarrasing loss.

G-Man says-USC 35 Furman 16.  I’m not ready to declare this a different sort of USC team just yet.  We have a terrible habit of playing down to our competition and I expect that to occur in the first half tomorrow.  As we have seen around the country, nothing is a gimme anymore.  Unfortunately, I remember the 1982 game, and a bunch of other embarrassing losses, very well.  Let’s hope I’m dead wrong and we steamroll FU from the opening kickoff.  After all, that’s what we should do.   I expect us to move guys into the box and make the Paladins chunk it.  If this happens, we should be well on the way to victory early on.  If they can run on us, expect a score close to my prediction.  As for the offense, we should have a field day on the ground.  SOS will likely take some chances in the passing game and get Shaw some snaps.  If the air attack starts rounding into shape, maybe we can put this one away early and coast in the second half.   But please………..don’t make this a repeat of the last game against Wofford.  My hope is that Coach Beamer has put the team on major upset alert after seeing what happened to daddy’s team last weekend.

The really amazing thing about this play is that Tori Gurley was not involved in some way.

How many times a day do you hear something described as ‘ironic?’

Without launching into hyperbole (another grossly misused word, witness any speech by Vice President Biden) I think I can safely say that I hear it every day.

And it’s almost always used incorrectly.  There’s even a 90’s era pop song by Alanis Morrisette called Isn’t it Ironic where the singer lists a series of unfortunate events that she repeatedly, and incorrectly, labels as ironic.

Ironic does not mean unexpected. Ironic does not mean surprising. Ironic does not mean contradictory.  Ironic does not even mean incongruous. Instead, something can rightly be described as ironic when the words or actions offered have a meaning different from what is expected, and the underlying message or situation has a profound or humorous result (whether intended or not).

Let me give an example.

This morning during my daily commute, I made the frequently unwise decision to listen to local sports radio.  As I live in the western part of Upstate South Carolina, WCCP out of Clemson is the sports radio station with the strongest signal.  That’s right, the C.T.U. propaganda station is my only local option.

This morning’s topic was the CTU-Auburn matchup.  After about 10 minutes of fascinating analysis by host Mickey Plyler (i.e. Cam Newton is a big framed guy, Auburn is only favored because it’s at home, etc.), his sidekick (whose name escapes me, but he sounds like a local [cue banjo music]) suddenly weighed in by saying “They’re ‘All In’ at Auburn now, can’t believe they stole that.” Mr. Plyler laughed in agreement, and then the commercials kicked in.

So apparently Gene Chizik is using the ‘All In’ slogan that Dabo pimped so diligently a couple of years back.  I guess I missed it, what with all the actually important football games going on, but this perceived slight is evidently a big deal in CTU world.

Here’s where the unintended irony kicks in: Everything about CTU is a cheap rip-off of someone or something else.

The mascot?  Copied from Auburn

The colors? Copied from Auburn(but with leftover jerseys where the blue had faded to purple #imcrappingyounegative)

The fight song? Copied from LSU

The stadium nickname?  Again, copied from LSU.

Howard’s Rock?  A leftover doorstop.

The head coach? A recycled real estate agent.

So the WCCP cats were calling someone else a rip off when they are completely copied themselves.

Isn’t it ironic?

Be happy, folks, be very happy.  It’s probable you last felt this optimistic on that beautiful fall afternoon of November 12, 2005.  South Carolina had just beaten Florida for our fifth straight SEC victory.  The future of the program looked brighter than ever.  The possibilities were endless.

Oh, sure, there have been moments since then, some glimmers.  But the 7-5 glimmers that we hoped would turn into 10-2 eye-searing sunbursts have never materialized under Steve Spurrier.  Those end of the season swoons doomed us.  Those horrific bowl games.  The corner never got turned.        

But now…

This week I’ve read words I’ve never seen applied to us this early in an SEC season.  Or at any point in any SEC season for that matter.  Words like contender and frontrunner.  Atlanta and December have been used in the same sentence.  We have been called a “complete” team.  We have a true freshman on Heisman watch lists who has been compared to Walker, Jackson, Smith and Peterson.  We have talented veterans and talented youngsters and depth.  So far we are even good on (gasp!) special teams.

I love the attention, I really do.  And I love the fact that I think we have a really good team for the first time under Spurrier.  I knew we were going to beat Georgia.  And I know we’re going to beat Furman the way the 13^th ranked team in the country is supposed to beat Furman. 

I’m having fun.  But still, I worry.

I worry that Marcus Lattimore carried the ball 37 times in his second college game ever.  I worry that he’s averaging 4.6 yards per carry instead of 6.4 yards per carry.  I worry that people are comparing him to Walker, Jackson, Smith and Peterson.  I worry that the offensive line wasn’t as good on Saturday as everyone is giving them credit for.  I worry that UGA’s 3-4 defense is just plain bad against the run.  I worry that we’re not getting pressure on the quarterback, and that we haven’t forced a bushel full of turnovers yet.  Most of all I’m worried about the three A’s:

Auburn, Alabama and Arkansas. 

Two of those teams we think are pretty good.  One we know is very good.

We’re a better team than Auburn, but we play them at Jordan Hare at night.  We’re not a better team than Alabama, but we play them at home.  We’re a better team than Arkansas, but what year are we not, yet we still lose to them too often.

Throw in Kentucky on the road and a Florida team that will right the ship (trust me), and that’s one heck of a minefield we have to negotiate. 

The first two weeks of the season couldn’t have been scripted any better.  I’ve seen similar scripts the past five years, but this one is definitely different.  I don’t believe the swoon will come this year. 

But still, I worry.

As you are about to find out, the views and/or opinions of one contributor to this blog are not necessarily the views and/or opinions of the other contributors to this blog.

With that out of the way, and I think I speak for 2/3 of our contributing body, I couldn’t give two deuces about Furman University, and I hope our football team humiliates them on a grand scale Saturday night. 

With all due respect to T-bone, a fine blogger and a fine American, the fact that he first read Faulkner (really? You didn’t read Faulkner until college?), decided to camp his way to California (yawn) and finally kissed a girl at Furman U (Senior year) has no bearing on my desire to have them beaten into oblivion this weekend.  With a fair amount of embellishment, his experience sounds like it would make a great Jon Krakauer novel, but this is about football.

So in response to his “27-24 would make me happy” post, here’s the how the South Carolina-Furman game could play out to make me happy:

1^st Quarter – C. Culliver returns the opening kickoff for a touchdown.  Finally.  Furman goes 3-and-out.  Spurrier throws the ball exclusively on the first series just to prove he/we can, scoring in a scant minute and twelve seconds.  Rinse and repeat a couple of times and it’s 28-0. 

2^nd Quarter – Defense continues to dominate, while we pound the ball on offense with #21.  He goes over 100 yards with two more TD’s and takes the rest of the night off along with Garcia.  With the score 42-0 at the half, SOS seeks out Bobby Lamb to shake his hand and let him know he’s going to stay in the locker room to watch the second half of Auburn-Clemson.  Got to start game planning.

3^rd Quarter – Shaw takes over at QB and mixes in a few passes along with the running of Miles and Giles to steadily move the ball down the field.  Shaw tosses a short TD to Cunningham to make the score 49-0.  Andrew Clifford later hits a long one to Demario Bennett and the score at the end of the third quarter is 56-0.  F.U. still has double digits in total offense.

4^th Quarter – Third- and fourth-teamers are now in the game.  Spurrier calls from the locker room to tell the coaches to let Seth Strickland throw a TD pass because “we’ve never had four QB’s throw a TD pass at South Carolina in the same game.”  Strickland does, and the final is 63-0. 

Postgame – Spurrier, looking about 40 years old and with a slight grin on his face, takes questions about running up the score.  “Maybe next time Furman will think twice about taking that paycheck,” he says.  “Heck, them boys at Georgia didn’t even get a paycheck, think about how bad they must feel.” 

How sweet would that be? 

Oh shut up, I can dream can’t I…

I remember when I read about this game three years ago in the The Greenville News.  My first reaction was “cccoooooollll”, but upon further reflection I realized it was a no-win proposition. 

You see, I graduated from Furman University.  And then I went on to get a graduate degree from USC.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve hated C.T.U since their Charlie Pell Semi-Pro Days, and my first strong memory of college sports was watching (and instantly loving) Big George on a Sunday morning telecast of The Jim Carlen Show.  My feelings for Carolina are strong, deep, and go back a long ways.

But how I feel about Furman is different.  Furman is the first place that ever made me feel dumb, and the first place I ever debated a teacher and won.  It’s the first place I read William Faulkner, and the place where I discovered Henry Miller.  It was the first time I ever lived on my own, and the place where I dreamed up and then executed a scheme to camp all the way to California.  It was where I first learned how to pick up girls and where I lost my -woah, [cough] ’bout to get too personal there.

Regardless, I love Furman.  And I won’t ever be able to pull against my alma mater.

But this might be (dear Chicken-Curse-in-Exile, I said might be) a special year at Carolina, and so I can’t pull for a JMU/Vtech style upset of my Gamecocks.

And it’s not like the game is a given.  Furman has a history of playing the big boys tough.  A couple of victories over NC State, a beatdown of a Georgia Tech squad, and a hard-fought victory over the Gamecocks during Richard Bell’s lone season as head coach are all modern-era examples.  Ask the Tar Heels about playing Furman for an even more recent example.   I fondly remember sitting in the dorm room as a third year student and listening to the radio broadcast as the Paladins dropped a close  contest against the Florida Gators and their first year head coach, some guy named Spurrier.

So I’ve played this game out in my head several different ways, and I think the following is the only thing that will make me happy:

1st Quarter – South Carolina runs two methodical drives down the field, and takes a 14-0 lead.  Furman picks up a couple of first downs, and kicks a long field goal to make it 14-3.

2nd Quarter – Connor Shaw engineers a drive that ends in a field goal.  Johnson starts sitting 1st stringers.  Furman drives the field against the 2nd string and scores to make it 17-10 at the half.

3rd Quarter – Garcia plays the first series, throws TD pass to Jeffrey.  Shaw engineers another drive that ends in a field goal. SC 27 FU 10 at end of quarter.

4th quarter – Spurrier begins mass substitution with walk-ons, etc.  Furman scores two late touchdowns (one on a 50 yard  out-and up against Carolina’s 4th string cornerback).

Final Score South Carolina 27 Furman 24.  Respectable showing by the Paladins, but the Gamecocks can leave the field knowing their first units weren’t touched.  Absolutely no injuries by either team.

This outcome might hurt us in the polls slightly (and that might be a good thing) but it keeps all the 2010 goals on the table for Carolina and lets Furman hold its head high as well.

Probably Outcome?  No. 

But it sure would make this dual-degree holder happy.

 

Not Garcia to Lattimore, although that was dandy.  Instead this exchange during the 2nd quarter of today’s radio broadcast:

Todd Ellis:  Lattimore trying to OWN Williams Brice Stadium!

Tommy Suggs:  With running like that, I’d give him the place for free . . . but that’s illegal.

Todd Ellis: So I’ve heard!

so much depends
upon

coach miles’
hat

pulled low over
his eyebrows

and absolutely
empty.