Everything LaNorris Sellers said after the win over Kentucky

LaNorris Sellers threw for 153 yards on 11-14 passing and rushed 14 times for 81 yards in South Carolina’s 35-13 win over Kentucky. Here’s what he said to the media after the game.

Question: Was that your granddad that Seth McGowan hit with the ball? 
Sellers: Yeah. 

Question: Is he okay? 
Sellers: Yeah. Nah, he was good. 

Question: Did you talk to Seth at all? Are you surprised there wasn’t a penalty thrown or anything? 
Sellers: No, I didn’t talk to him, no. No, I just went to (my grandfather) after the game, and he was good and all that.

Question: You didn’t know that it was your grandpa during the game? 
Sellers: No, I saw it before. I saw everything happen. 

Question: Did you have a reaction?
Sellers: I saw it. When they showed on the I was like, “Oh, yo, that’s my granddaddy.” 

Question: How did you feel about the offense as a whole and specifically with the run game?
Sellers: It was better. We’ve just got to continue to get better, fix those little things, and we’ll be all right.

Question: What helped tonight in terms of you getting going in the run game? 
Sellers: I don’t really think a lot changed. I think I was just more aggressive, really. When I’m running the ball, we can throw it as well. So it’s kind of like, if they were overplaying it, I’m pulling it. And if they’re overplaying the pass, I’m making that one guy miss, and it’s pretty much good from there.

Question: You didn’t ask your grandfather why he didn’t catch that?
Sellers: No, but since you asked for that, as soon as I leave here, I’m probably going to find him and ask him that.

Question: How have you seen Vandrevius Jacobs come along on the field and off the field?
Sellers: Just getting more confidence and comfortable, really. (Inaudible) He can run, he can obviously make guys miss. He’s good in the open field so I’m checking the ball on him. 

Question: After they took the opening kickoff down and scored, were you anxious to try to answer?
Sellers: Yeah, definitely. Any time a team comes to our stadium and tries to score on that first drive, it’s like, all right, we’ve got to go and answer. That’s not just this game, though; that’s pretty much any game you play. 

Question: It just looked like tonight you were just more confident, like there were images of the Clemson game from last year. Did you feel that at all?
Sellers: I think it was just me playing football. It just happens. Pass protection breaks down sometimes, they blitz sometimes, you’ve got to get out of it and make a play.

Question: After a difficult couple of weeks for the team, what does a win like this do for you morale-wise, confidence-wise, going into the bye week? 
Sellers: It obviously builds it. Then going into a bye week is good, going in with a win. We’ve got two weeks to recover, get a lot of guys healthy. We’re going in in good spirits.

Your GamecockCentral membership starts at just $1 for the first week – and we’ll throw in a complimentary year of access to The Athletic.

Question: This was the most yards gained for the team in a game this season. Do you feel like you have turned the corner?
Sellers: Yes. Obviously, we can continue to get better. Some stuff we missed, a lot of stuff we miss still, but it’s a good start. 

Question: How do you feel the rushing game looked, and what did you see from Matt Fuller?
Sellers: It’s a lot more balanced. (Inaudible) (Fuller) can break a lot of tackles. He’s slippery, he’s solid. So he just bounced off those hits. It was good to get him in there against an SEC defense, let him get in, take a couple hits, and get some yards.

Question: You spread the ball around a lot in the passing game. Is that something you wanted to do, or is that just how the game played out? 
Sellers: It’s just how played out for me. 

Question: How did you apply the things you talked about in chapel, perspective, perseverance in partnership, to this game tonight? 
Sellers: Really just to build an identity, and just all working together as one. It’s the main thing, really. It takes all 11 guys. 

Question: What is something you would like to see improve most over the bye week? 
Sellers: Just fixing those little things as I was talking about earlier. Same thing, pretty much: communication, execution, spreading the ball around. Stuff like that, just finding more ways to get balls to the playmakers.

Question: It seemed like they were playing for the run on first and second down and they pretty much stuffed it. Would you like to see a little more imagination there? 
Sellers: Yeah, it’s scheme-wise something that we can talk about all the time. We knew they would be soft in coverage, so it’s like if we could pop a run in here, make something happen, but I mean, they know it’s coming, so something we can fix and work on.

Question: When your defense has two touchdowns, what are you saying to the offense to keep that momentum? And you said you gave your grandpa the game ball afterward?
Sellers: Yes. Pretty much it’s just staying warm because we were on the sideline for a long time. But they’re going out there making plays, they score points, so it’s easy on us. We’ve just got to keep it rolling, keep them off the field as much as we can. 

Question: When you have that many options, how much pressure does that take off your shoulders?
Sellers: It takes a lot. The defense can’t really key on one person. It’s three other guys, four other guys, that they’ve got to worry about, too. If they’re too aggressive on one, somebody else is open. If two guys are on one, somebody else is open.

Question: Did you feel like this was a must-win game?
Sellers: Yeah. Definitely just coming off the last two weeks, we didn’t play our best. We know that. Going into the bye week, we had to get an SEC win. We’ve still got everything we want ahead of us. We’ve just got to take it one game at a time, and tonight was the start.

Discuss South Carolina football on The Insiders Forum!