I’ve been reading this board for years and never thought my first post would be after… that.
But honestly, as insane as it sounds after blowing a 30–3 lead and losing 31–30, tonight actually made me more encouraged about where this program is headed, not less.
We just went on the road, into Kyle Field, against an undefeated, top-3 Texas A&M team playing for the playoff, and for 30 minutes we didn’t just hang — we dominated. That wasn’t a fluke blocked punt and a lucky bounce. That was LaNorris carving them up, Harbor taking the top off a CFP defense, our lines winning at the point of attack, and their crowd completely out of it. You don’t go up 30–3 on that team in that building by accident.
Yeah, the second half was a disaster. Nobody’s denying that. But look at the bigger picture: for the first time in a long time, we saw our ceiling in an SEC game that actually mattered nationally. For one half, we looked like the ranked, dangerous program we all keep saying we can be. That’s not nothing.
They flashed the stat during the broadcast: SEC teams down 27+ were 0–237 before today. The national story is going to be “A&M finally makes it 1–237,” and we’re the punchline. But zoom out: you can’t even create that kind of record-breaking comeback unless you’re good enough to build that 27-point lead on the road in the first place. The margin between being the butt of the joke and walking out of there with a program-defining win was a couple of plays, a couple of calls, and some kids who are still learning how to close.
Everyone’s going to jump on LaNorris, but if you’re actually watching the growth, this is exactly the kind of scar tissue future great QBs have on their résumé. He’s already had the comebacks, the big drives, the rivalry moments. Now he’s got the “national eyes on you, everything collapses, how do you respond?” chapter. And the fact that he’s already come out and doubled down on South Carolina instead of running from the heat says a lot to me about the guy we’ve got leading this thing the next few years.
Same with Beamer. Is tonight on him in a lot of ways? Absolutely. Game management, adjustments, all of it. But this is also the first time under him where we’ve seen a Beamer team go toe-to-toe for a full half with a legit playoff team on the road while we’re sitting at 3–6 and most of the country wrote us off weeks ago. A checked-out locker room doesn’t punch like that early. A fractured culture doesn’t fly around like we did in the first half when there’s “nothing to play for.” That tells me the foundation is still there, even if the details are a mess.
And as crazy as it sounds, a loss like this is going to live on tape rooms and highlight packages for years. Recruits are going to see Harbor streaking down the sideline, Sellers dropping dimes, our defense swarming in the first half, and the announcers talking about South Carolina controlling the game against a top-3 team in November. They’ll see that before they check the final score. You don’t think opposing coaches are going to have a hard time explaining that first half to a kid whose other main offer is from us?
Are we where we want to be? Obviously not. We’re 3–7. We just made the wrong kind of history. That stings and it should. But sometimes you can literally feel the moment where a program hits the absolute bottom of the valley and starts climbing out. Tonight felt like that to me. Not because of the collapse, but because of how real the first 30 minutes were and how much this is going to stick with every single guy who comes back.
If the choice is: 1.) Sleepwalk to a forgettable 21–10 loss no one remembers, or 2.) Punch a playoff team in the mouth for a half, expose every weakness we have in the most brutal way possible, and force this staff and roster to confront exactly what’s holding them back…
…then as painful as it is, I think we got the version that actually pushes a program forward.
This one is going to be replayed every time somebody talks about “no lead is safe” in the SEC. Fine. Let them run it. Because buried in every one of those clips is proof that South Carolina, even in a “down” 3–7 year, can walk into a playoff contender’s house and look like the better team for an entire half of football.
It hurts now. It should. But a few years from now, if we’re where we all say we want to be, don’t be shocked if we look back and say, “Yeah, that night in College Station… that’s when these guys finally figured out what they were capable of — and what they could never let happen again.”
But honestly, as insane as it sounds after blowing a 30–3 lead and losing 31–30, tonight actually made me more encouraged about where this program is headed, not less.
We just went on the road, into Kyle Field, against an undefeated, top-3 Texas A&M team playing for the playoff, and for 30 minutes we didn’t just hang — we dominated. That wasn’t a fluke blocked punt and a lucky bounce. That was LaNorris carving them up, Harbor taking the top off a CFP defense, our lines winning at the point of attack, and their crowd completely out of it. You don’t go up 30–3 on that team in that building by accident.
Yeah, the second half was a disaster. Nobody’s denying that. But look at the bigger picture: for the first time in a long time, we saw our ceiling in an SEC game that actually mattered nationally. For one half, we looked like the ranked, dangerous program we all keep saying we can be. That’s not nothing.
They flashed the stat during the broadcast: SEC teams down 27+ were 0–237 before today. The national story is going to be “A&M finally makes it 1–237,” and we’re the punchline. But zoom out: you can’t even create that kind of record-breaking comeback unless you’re good enough to build that 27-point lead on the road in the first place. The margin between being the butt of the joke and walking out of there with a program-defining win was a couple of plays, a couple of calls, and some kids who are still learning how to close.
Everyone’s going to jump on LaNorris, but if you’re actually watching the growth, this is exactly the kind of scar tissue future great QBs have on their résumé. He’s already had the comebacks, the big drives, the rivalry moments. Now he’s got the “national eyes on you, everything collapses, how do you respond?” chapter. And the fact that he’s already come out and doubled down on South Carolina instead of running from the heat says a lot to me about the guy we’ve got leading this thing the next few years.
Same with Beamer. Is tonight on him in a lot of ways? Absolutely. Game management, adjustments, all of it. But this is also the first time under him where we’ve seen a Beamer team go toe-to-toe for a full half with a legit playoff team on the road while we’re sitting at 3–6 and most of the country wrote us off weeks ago. A checked-out locker room doesn’t punch like that early. A fractured culture doesn’t fly around like we did in the first half when there’s “nothing to play for.” That tells me the foundation is still there, even if the details are a mess.
And as crazy as it sounds, a loss like this is going to live on tape rooms and highlight packages for years. Recruits are going to see Harbor streaking down the sideline, Sellers dropping dimes, our defense swarming in the first half, and the announcers talking about South Carolina controlling the game against a top-3 team in November. They’ll see that before they check the final score. You don’t think opposing coaches are going to have a hard time explaining that first half to a kid whose other main offer is from us?
Are we where we want to be? Obviously not. We’re 3–7. We just made the wrong kind of history. That stings and it should. But sometimes you can literally feel the moment where a program hits the absolute bottom of the valley and starts climbing out. Tonight felt like that to me. Not because of the collapse, but because of how real the first 30 minutes were and how much this is going to stick with every single guy who comes back.
If the choice is: 1.) Sleepwalk to a forgettable 21–10 loss no one remembers, or 2.) Punch a playoff team in the mouth for a half, expose every weakness we have in the most brutal way possible, and force this staff and roster to confront exactly what’s holding them back…
…then as painful as it is, I think we got the version that actually pushes a program forward.
This one is going to be replayed every time somebody talks about “no lead is safe” in the SEC. Fine. Let them run it. Because buried in every one of those clips is proof that South Carolina, even in a “down” 3–7 year, can walk into a playoff contender’s house and look like the better team for an entire half of football.
It hurts now. It should. But a few years from now, if we’re where we all say we want to be, don’t be shocked if we look back and say, “Yeah, that night in College Station… that’s when these guys finally figured out what they were capable of — and what they could never let happen again.”
