South Carolina’s offense showed its ceiling; what’s next?

South Carolina’s football team has the ceiling on offense.

Up next is the consistency.

Early against Missouri on Saturday night, in a game that had all the promise of a shootout, USC’s attack wasn’t keeping pace. An early long drive came up short inside the Missouri 15. The next two produced one first down. Quarterback Jake Bentley, the guy around whom the attack revolves, missed a couple throws he would’ve loved to have back.

Against an explosive offense like Missouri’s that can be costly, and could have been worse than a 10-0 deficit.

Then came Deebo Samuel’s outburst, to swing things.

In the second half, USC (2-0, 1-0 SEC) mounted three scoring drives in the first four possessions. They were aided by big chunk plays, but a couple were controlled marches, efficient passing working alongside a running game that had worn down the opposition.

South Carolina coach Will Muschamp said the players mattered more than the plays, and USC certainly has the former. Tight end Hayden Hurst said his group knew what it had missed early and what it remained capable of.

“We don’t get down at any point in the game,” Hurst said. “We know our offense can strike from any point and I think that showed today. We just have to have a little patience and execute the game plan”

Game 1 gave an indication of how high the Gamecocks attack can go, but the overall output didn’t quite reflect that. Game 2 was a step forward, a half about the level the team can hit, with Bentley in control.

Muschamp’s team is still relying a lot on little things: winning special teams, a defense standing tall again and again in the red zone, turnovers setting up great field position. Those are important, but they are a hard thing to win on week to week.

Saturday, as they had the previous week, those things provided more time, time for an offense still young to get its feet under it and move closer to what should be a dominant ceiling.

This story was originally published September 9, 2017 at 11:58 PM with the headline "South Carolina’s offense showed its ceiling; what’s next?."