Scott Davis: After Saturday, we only know what we don’t know

Scott Davis has followed South Carolina athletics for over 40 years and provides commentary from a fan perspective. He writes a weekly newsletter year-round (sign up here) and a column during football season that’s published each Monday on GamecockCentral.com.

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Even before Saturday night, there was a growing unease settling across the South Carolina fan base, a creeping sense of dread that seemed odd for supporters of a team that was undefeated.

Those first two games of the 2025 season had been…well, interesting.

Those first two games had been wins, yes. But not emphatic wins. Not confidence-building wins. Not, alas, the wins we’d been expecting during the long offseason, not what we’d seen in our minds as we looked towards what we all hoped might be a dream season.

Still, early season games are always a crapshoot, and no team across the country had looked particularly dominant during the first two weeks. So, we dutifully flushed games One and Two, and looked towards Saturday night’s contest with the Vanderbilt Commodores as the moment the season would finally ignite.

You see, despite the lessons of history and our own better judgment, we’d allowed our preseason hopes to soar towards the clouds. The College Football Playoff? The Heisman Trophy? A spot among the game’s elite programs?

All seemed possible as August dawned.

At least we kept reassuring each other that it was.

At times it almost seemed like we were trying to talk ourselves into the idea. What was striking, even during those giddy days during the beginning of practice, was how many Gamecock fans I spoke with who expressed uncertainty, discomfort and even doubt about the unchecked optimism.

Were we really sure this was a Playoff team?

Were we really sure this offense had enough experienced weapons and was strong enough in the trenches to support LaNorris Sellers? Were we really sure this defense could replace all those key contributors in the starting lineup?

Were we sure about all this – this championship chatter?

Many of us didn’t seem to be, at least during my preseason conversations with friends, family, fans and readers.  

And yet the national media loved us, didn’t they? For the first time in my lifetime, the talking heads on ESPN and the sportswriters based in New York and California seemed almost infatuated with our very own university and its football program.

It was hard to resist all that attention, doubts be damned. Could this thing actually go as planned? Why not?

Then the Gamecocks had to battle to survive those first two games, doing little to boost the idea that the program was a Top 10-caliber team. And then came Saturday night.

Then came a deflating, decisive 31-7 home loss to a team South Carolina had beaten 16 straight times. Then came a frightening first half injury to Sellers, and with it a gut punch to the fan base’s hopes and dreams for what the 2025 season might become.

As I watched Sellers lay writhing on the Williams-Brice turf, I will admit that I was tempted to go ahead and reset all of my expectations for the remaining nine games. We could go ahead and shut down the Playoff and Heisman talk and start getting our minds right for a mid-tier bowl game (or maybe even something worse). Shreveport or bust, baby!

By Sunday morning, I had decided to wait and see.

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from our years aboard the Shane Beamer Express, it’s that whatever you think is about to happen next is not about to happen. Whatever you’re planning on, plan for something different. The only thing we know is what we don’t know.

So where do we go from here?

Right now, I feel supremely confident that South Carolina is not about to shock the world by winning on the road at Missouri this coming weekend. But haven’t I been here before? Haven’t I felt this way a million other times over the last five years?

Haven’t I witnessed turnarounds so shocking they still defy description?

During the Beamer Era, there have been moments just as grim, just as dark and just as lonely as this particular moment now seems to be. And they’ve almost always been followed by moments of surprising, even unimaginable joy.

For now, let’s settle in and see what happens next.

I can promise you that none of us knows what it will be.

The “Hang On, Are We Really Handing Out Game Balls After a Beatdown by Freaking Vanderbilt” Game Balls of the Week

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The Pregame Atmosphere at Williams-Brice – It was electric in there, and W-B looked as stirring and as jacked as I’ve seen it at any point in recent memory. Even the SEC Network’s announcers gushed about the scene. It’s a shame the game had to start, because the party inside the stadium was rollicking.

Not Listening to Sports Talk Radio, Glancing at Message Boards, Watching Anything on the SEC Network or In General Paying Attention to College Football for Several Days – Is something I’m looking forward to doing this week, and I urge you to join me.  

Not Having to Talk About the Winning Streak Against Vanderbilt Anymore – Yes, of course I wanted the streak to last for the next 75 years. But still, it will almost be a relief next year to not have to reflect on whether this will finally be the season Vandy ends its losing streak against South Carolina. Knowing that the streak had to end sometime made each game against the Commodores over the last few seasons seem like a nerve-wracking soap opera.

Diego Pavia Not Being Eligible to Play College Football After 2025 – Are you like me? Are you absolutely ecstatic about never having to watch South Carolina play Pavia again? And it’s not just because he’s a talented quarterback, either.

The Four Turnovers Deflated Balls of the Week

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Four Turnovers in an SEC Game – Is a recipe for losing an SEC game by 24 points.

South Carolina’s Never-Ending Offensive Uncertainties – In the decade since Steve Spurrier hung up the visor, South Carolina fans grown accustomed to watching an inconsistent, occasionally potent, occasionally dreadful offense that never quite lives up to our expectations. The Will Muschamp years were filled with multiple offensive coordinators, multiple offensive approaches and very little offensive output.

Here in Year Five of the Shane Beamer Experience, we’re still waiting on an offense that lights up the scoreboard with consistency and precision. Mike Shula represents the third offensive coordinator in five seasons under Beamer, and the early returns in 2025 aren’t exactly generating waves of optimism. The Gamecocks were bailed out by big plays on special teams and defense in the first two games, and they found the end zone just a single time against Vanderbilt.

Even before Sellers went down late in the first half, the offense had already displayed some of the same frustrating qualities for which it has become known in recent years – maddening penalties, self-inflicted errors and turnovers. If the program is ever going to take the next step, it’s going to need to take a step forward on offense.

The Officiating Crew Very Nearly Missing the Targeting Call on Sellers’ Injury – Just an infuriating sequence of events. After Sellers was drilled in the helmet by a Vanderbilt defensive player and had to be helped off the field, the officiating crew stood by and planned to move on as though it were business as usual. It’s hard to overstate how surprising this was in this day and age, when the game has been transformed in an effort to protect players from head injuries (to the point that unavoidable contact is often flagged for penalties). After South Carolina inserted Luke Doty in at quarterback, the Gamecocks dialed up a pass to Nyck Harbor that looked like it might have a chance to go the distance…only to then have the officials stop play to review the injury.

That led to an enraged Beamer screaming at the crew on the sidelines (and to me screaming at the crew from my couch). What happened there? In what universe should that play have ever not been reviewed immediately?

For now, in the aftermath of 31-7, we can only wait and see.

It feels like we might already know how this all ends. But the only thing we know for sure is that we don’t.

In fact, the only thing we know is that we don’t know what’s coming next.

Tell me how you’re feeling after a gruesome Saturday night by writing me at [email protected].

DISCUSSION: See what other Gamecock fans are saying about the Vanderbilt game