What Cole Cubelic said about South Carolina's win over Kentucky and reasons for hope for the offense

No one in the media watches more SEC film than SEC Network analyst Cole Cubelic, who also happened to have sideline duties this past week for South Carolina’s 35-13 win over Kentucky.

Each week, Cubelic breaks down every SEC game with a quick-hitter on his Twitter account and then also goes more in-depth on his podcast.

Cubelic, who has had South Carolina twice this season, was impressed with how the Gamecocks turned the matchup into the style of fight they wanted.

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“Big bounce back win,” Cubelic posted on Twitter. “Made it the game they wanted. Get crowd involved, tee off on QB & let QB make plays. He was efficient & deliberate. Use of TEs helped. Got the run going a little better than first few weeks. Zone stuff had a better chance. QB design threat has to be there to open it up.

“Thought OL had much better energy. Brought the fight. (Trovon Baugh) & (Shed Sarratt) led the way. Strained a little more. (Vandrevius Jacobs) is coming into his own. He & (Brian Rowe) are needed for a strong finish. Love 14 personnel late. Every team needs a (Maurice Brown II), might be my favorite player in the league. Just want to trade paint. Brings an edge.

“Defense flew around. Attacked the ball. Got to the QB. (Bryan Thomas Jr.) nice off edge. (Nick Barrett) really good disrupting inside. (JayR Johnson) showed good versatility on edge. Mixed fronts. (Dylan Stewart) was active after a slow start. (JT Geer) & (Gerald Kilgore) made plays. Won their style fight.”

South Carolina enters its bye week at 3-2 with wins over the Wildcats, Virginia Tech, and South Carolina State.

With one of the toughest slates in the conference left on deck, the start to the season is not what anyone in Gamecock Nation was hoping for or expecting, especially on offense.

But Cubelic did see some reasons for optimism on that side of the ball coming out of the break.

“Matt Fuller gives them a little something extra at running back,” he said on his podcast. “But Vandrevius Jacobs is coming on and Maurice Brown is coming on at wide receiver (and tight end) for South Carolina [Editors note: Cubelic also mentioned Rowe in his Twitter post and may have also meant to mention him here].

“So my point in saying that is, if they start getting good receiver play, with already good tight end play, and a quarterback that’s a real dual threat, and the whole thing with Nyck Harbor down the field where teams at least have to still be worried about it and make sure it doesn’t kill ’em, they might be able to get this thing going offensively. It’s not out of the realm of possibility.”

Cubelic also added a caveat.

“They do have to continue to run LaNorris Sellers, though,” he added. “Because the couple of free runners at him, cannot continue to happen. That can’t be it.”

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