South Carolina Three Keys: Georgia

Three-keys-USC

This is what makes college football so terrifying… and fun. The season has barely begun. Teams are still trying to learn who they are and what they have. The weather is still hot. The chill of autumn hasn’t arrived. It’s not really football weather, but it is football season… and a season-defining game arrives for a team. That is the case for South Carolina.

The Gamecocks have the pressure – but also the privilege and the opportunity – of being the first SEC team to face the defending league champion Georgia Bulldogs.

South Carolina knows that in order to have any chance of winning the SEC East, it will very likely have to win this game. The Gamecocks won’t be expected to beat Georgia, but early in the season, the uncertainties surrounding rosters could unearth advantages and openings for coach Will Muschamp’s team. If South Carolina can take advantage of this situation, it will have a program-changing win to tout to future recruits. It can slow down the Georgia Express, which roared to life last season and came an eyelash from winning the national championship.

Here are three keys for this huge game:

1 – FIND HUGE PLAYS

Georgia won’t be beaten in an incrementalist style. If this game is fought in small spaces and the gains made by offenses are slight and paltry, Georgia is in better position to win. The Bulldogs would love to make this game ugly and enable Kirby Smart’s defense to grind down the Gamecocks’ offense into so much fine powder. Playing at home, South Carolina wants this game to become a fireworks show, with Georgia’s defense being caught off guard, much as it was for most of the Rose Bowl against Oklahoma. If Jake Bentley and Deebo Samuel (and others) are making very big gains on Saturday, South Carolina will score several touchdowns and force Georgia’s offense to have to keep up. Will Muschamp might be a defensive coach, but he has to lean on his offense this season.

Speaking of that offense…

2 – USE DEEBO IN MANY WAYS

Naturally, Deebo Samuel will want to be the guy who catches the big pass and makes the big play to win this game, but the larger reality facing South Carolina is that it shouldn’t expect Deebo to thrive in only one way. Therefore, it can’t afford to use him in only one way. Samuel needs to be, at times, the guy who draws double coverage so that another receiver can get open. Samuel might not always be open on downfield passing routes, and Georgia might do things to take him away as a receiver. However, the Gamecocks can get the ball to Deebo on screen or hitch passes. They can hand the ball off to him on jet sweeps. South Carolina has to keep mixing up the looks it gives to the Georgia defense.

3 – BACK SEVEN TACKLING

There is no Nick Chubb or Sony Michel for Georgia. The Bulldogs probably won’t be as dynamic on the ground as they were last year. This means South Carolina linebackers, safeties and corners have to make sure UGA does not get long touchdown runs. Players need to wrap up and be ready to fill gaps if Georgia running backs get past the line of scrimmage.

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