Jalon Kilgore explains what changed for South Carolina's defense in November
It’s no secret South Carolina’s defense struggled for most of this year. Things got real bad in October when Clayton White’s group allowed roughly 35 points per game, leading straight to a winless month.
But once November rolled around, things slowly started to change. White changed up his game plan and it led to good results. The biggest difference was that the Gamecocks were starting to use a 3-3-5 defensive package.
“It was an amazing game plan throwing in the 3-3-5,” freshman defensive back Jalon Kilgore said in a Garnet Trust interview with GamecockCentral’s Chris Clark. “I feel like it gave more guys an opportunity to show their talent.”
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With a new scheme implemented, it allowed for more players to step up and make an impact. Perhaps the biggest to benefit from the package was redshirt senior linebacker Bam Martin-Scott. He made 32 tackles in the last four games. To put it into perspective, he had only made six tackles in the first eight games of the year.
“I really feel like our mindset just changed,” Kilgore said. “In practice, we’ll have way more aggressiveness, getting punch outs, running to the ball. Say we were in scout, if the quarterback didn’t throw the ball, they’d throw us a ball to make it seem like we were getting an interception or picking up a fumble.”
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Despite so much change, it didn’t seen to affect Kilgore’s game. He still had a great year, finishing with 76 tackles, one forced fumble and an interception. He was a huge part of South Carolina’s defense.
“The positions that we’ve played, we’ve done in different types of formations,” he said. “So it really wasn’t nothing new that we had to learn. It was really just the front, basically.”
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Over the final four games, South Carolina allowed 55 total points, which averaged out to just 13.8 points per game.
The Gamecocks also forced 10 turnovers. Before then, they had went more than a month without a takeaway and had seven in September. So when they got one, the rest started coming in bunches.
“It’s definitely big for momentum,” Kilgore said. “It just moves the offense into, most of the time, a good position to go down and score. So I know that boosted their confidence. They can use their packages more on deep balls and things like that. So it’s just a big momentum shift for the whole team.”
