What Christian Beal-Smith's return could mean for South Carolina
It didn’t take long for Marcus Satterfield to address the, as he called it, South Carolina’s “elephant in the room.”
The Gamecocks, coming off a 21-point win and now staring down the barrel of a game against a top-20 Arkansas team, needs to run the ball better to have a good chance to win Saturday.
“We have to be able to block people and block movement and be able to function in space. It’s not just the offensive line. All I’ve heard about is the offensive line, which had its own struggles, but we got our butts kicked on the perimeter,” Satterfield said.
“We knew we had to get the ball on the perimeter and we got whipped on the perimeter. That’s a huge emphasis for us.”
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The Gamecocks averaged 3.3 yards per rush attempt (excluding sack yardage) with over half of their attempts going for two yards or fewer.
The good news for South Carolina is Shane Beamer expects Christian Beal-Smith back in the fold this week.
That could be a much-needed addition to the Gamecocks’’ running back room going on the road to Arkansas.
“His experience and the size he brings. He’s a downhill runner that’s produced at Wake Forest and had a lot of really big games. We can certainly use his maturity and experience,” Shane Beamer said.
“We’ll be ready to go with whatever. But getting CBS back would be awesome. It’s added depth and he’s a great special teams player as well then the maturity he brings to that room.”
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Beamer reiterated South Carolina has confidence in MarShawn Lloyd and Juju McDowell as well as Jaheim Bell. The tight end rushed seven times Saturday.
But getting someone as seasoned as Beal-Smith could be big.
In four seasons at Wake Forest Beal-Smith averaged 4.8 yards per rush on 391 carries with 14 touchdowns.
Last season (131 carries) he had 16 rushes of at least 10 yards with 18 missed tackles forced and 2.45 yards after contact per carry.
Over his career he’s forced 70 missed tackles and averaged 2.92 yards after contact per carry.
It might not completely fix the Gamecocks’ rushing woes, but getting a bruising running back into the rotation could help.
“I mean he’s that consistent, low-to-the-ground stump basically. You give him the ball and he’s going to move that thing forward two or three yards at worst,” Satterfield said. “To have his maturity, he’s had a lot of experience playing at Wake. To get him back on the field will help us tremendously, especially at that position.”
South Carolina now has to take its rushing attack and pit it against an Arkansas defense that had just a 10.7 stuff rate but allowed just 3.6 yards per carry.
Satterfield’s had to scale back some on South Carolina’s run game plan this week to try and deal with the Razorbacks’ ability to play both three and four-man fronts.
“We’ve had to pull back a lot in the run game just cause we can’t rep it all versus all the different looks,” Satterfield said. “We’re going to have a nice, simple attack and attack these guys. Hopefully our O-line improves.”
