I just got done reviewing the tape on the South Carolina game, and I must say one thing jumped out at me immediately: South Carolina absolutely would have lost this game against any team with a functional offense. Period. End of discussion. UNC turned the ball over on not one, not two, but THREE picks, and two of them were in the end zone. If there was ever a tape to show potential Quarterbacks exactly what NOT to do, this would be perfect. Ship it to every player and force them to watch this terrible game because it was like watching two JV Middle school programs attempt to throw the football. Overthrows? Check. Late across your body? Check. One-read-stare-downs? You better believe it.
Since this is an SEC blog I'll spare the UNC fans the agony of detailing to you how your QB sucked. But man, I've seen some interceptions in my day, and I've rarely seen so many of them thrown right at defenders. Like, not even a guy in the screen wearing blue kind of interceptions. It was pitch and catch to the wrong team, and that's entirely what sunk UNC, along with an inexplicable decision by the coaches to go for a 4th and 1 on their own 35 that they failed to convert. It was like Coach Larry Fedora for UNC had money on the other side. I couldn't believe it.
Anyway, I'll start with Connor Mitch, the new South Carolina QB. And if it were up to me after this game, he'd never start again. If you read the stat line you'd see that he was 9/22 (40.9%) for 122 yards and a passing TD to Pharoh Cooper. That sounds bad, but the actual witnessing of it was so much worse. In Mitch's first possession he somehow got a delay of game. That was the first possession of the whole game. As in, they kicked to SC, they lined up out of a commercial break, and somehow Connor Mitch didn't know how to get the play off. I think I've seen it maybe once before in my life, but I can't recall. Either way, I was dumb-founded. It went downhill from there.
Connor continued his lackluster play by overthrowing a receiver by 10 yards, and SC's first possession was a 3-and-out. In his second possession, it was more of the same with another SC 3-and-out, BUT the tricksy punter decided to pull it down for a fake and got a key first down. Sensing how terrible this was going for his QB, Coach Spurrier decided he had to take the pressure of Mitch. He did this with 3 basic moves: Pharoh Cooper went into the Wildcat formation, he opened up the short passing game with some screens, and he told Mitch to just take off if his first read wasn't there. But I should note that even though Mitch completed a big pass later in the game, he also immediately took an unsportsmanlike taunting penalty. The quarterback that barely completed a pass finally did it and managed to get flagged taunting the other team. I'd have benched his sorry ass right there. Spurrier must be more forgiving. (That's a joke, he'll likely kill him and eat him as I'm writing this, then pretend Mitch never existed)
Now, the only upside I can give to Connor Mitch is that he can sense the pocket and run. He has decent wheels, and if there's no spy he can really hurt you on the scramble. He did this 10 times actually, which is pretty rare for a QB that wasn't exactly supposed to be a dual threat. Then again, most of the time when Mitch tried to throw, I was horrified. The throws were so bad that they couldn't even get intercepted, just float harmlessly out of bounds. Then again, the genius of Spurrier was that he was covering his QB's problems by trying to get his best player Cooper into quick slant situations.
The more times Pharoh Cooper touches the ball, the better for SC's offense. If you take him out of that team, they might not score 14 points offensively. He's that important and that good. If you're a defensive coordinator setting up for South Carolina, I suggest 2 things: 1 - Have a damn good plan for double-covering Cooper, and be ready for him in the wildcat. 2 - Make Conner Mitch stay in the pocket and throw. If you do that and can score 21+ points of your own? Congrats, it's lights out for the Gamecocks.
But there's one more key offensive piece that showed up late for the Gamecocks, and that was #7 Sean Carson. The change-of-pace running back busted a 48-yard run to the right for a touchdown that ended up winning the game. What was interesting to me was how many successful running plays South Carolina had to the right. I couldn't really discern whether it was a hole UNC's offense, a power side running game on the SC offense, or a combo of both. Either way, when the play went well on the run, I noticed it was on the right side.
Mitch cramped up a few times, and that was when backup QB Perry Orth came in, whom I can only assume lost the starting job because nobody respects a game named Perry as a leader. Still, Perry can actually throw the ball and went 2/2 while he was in the game for 24 yards. I'm seriously wondering what the long term is for that position if Mitch has another bad game, because Orth in the limited time I saw him looked much more comfortable.
On defense, South Carolina spent most of the game looking lost in the run game. UNC was gashing them between the tackles, especially with their big-time runningback Elijah Hood. I almost typed in the actor who played a Hobbit, if that helps you remember his name. Hood went for 138 yards on 12 carries if that gives you any idea as to how dominant he was. And yet, UNC only handed him the ball for 12 carries. For some bizarre reason they kept putting the game into the hands of their inept QB Williams who not only turned it over, but also had a hard time making simple completions late. It would end up costing them the game.
There's one guy on defense that stands out head and shoulders above the rest for South Carolina, and that's #10 LB Skai Moore, who had 2 interceptions and 10 total tackles in just one game. If I'm on the other side, I'm doing everything I can to move my offense to the other side of the field away from Moore, and closer to #28 Jonathan Walton. While Walton did make a few tackles, my eye was getting drawn to him on the field as he kept finding his way out of position. Runs would go at his zone, and he would have mistakenly gone the other way. He'd be late to tackles, behind on catches. I'd like to see what a smart OC could do with a tight end playing off his position in the soft zone. You'd likely get a few easy 3rd down conversions with that type of play. Considering the new defensively coordinator at SC, I can't tell if Walton is just lost in the new scheme or if the DC hasn't figured out how to utilize him. Either way, it didn't look good.
In the end, South Carolina won out because UNC couldn't stop throwing it to the other team, and they capitalized on a big defensive lapse that led to a huge running play score. That's pretty much it. If I'm looking at the team as a whole, I think a functional SEC squad should have an easy time gameplanning for what this Game 1 version of South Carolina looks like. However, Spurrier is no dummy and he will take plenty of time to look at the tape and fix some of the glaring holes. I really wonder if he can fix Connor Mitch, though.
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