A year ago, South Carolina celebrated making a bowl; now ‘it’s something we expect’

South Carolina football coach Will Muschamp earned himself a solid little distinction Saturday.

He’s only the second South Carolina coach in school history to lead the football team to bowl eligibility in his first two years. Steve Spurrier was the first.

There are obviously some caveats, as the modern proliferation of bowls only happened in the past few decades. But looking back, only three other coaches since pre-World War II would have qualified by the modern standard.

But bowl eligibility isn’t much of a thing for USC these days.

Last year it was, when that was the prize for finishing off an FCS team a week before facing a juggernaut Clemson team. These days, with USC’s program on more stable ground, bowls are par for the course.

“We don’t talk about that,” coach Will Muschamp said. “It’s something we expect.”

The Gamecocks saw a run of seven bowls in a row snapped by the Spurrier retirement/Shawn Elliott season in 2015. USC had played in the postseason nine of 10 years to that point, starting with Spurrier’s hiring.

Things did not look good in 2016 before Jake Bentley was inserted at quarterback and a 2-4 start was erased by a hot finish that included an upset of Tennessee.

Now riding at 6-2, with seven or eight wins in range and perhaps more, this is more just a signpost on the road than the destination.

“I don’t want to downplay the importance of making it to a bowl game,” quarterback Jake Bentley said. “That’s obviously something that’s a big deal for us, but also, we know we’ve got a lot more games to play and bigger goals.”

This story was originally published October 29, 2017 at 12:43 PM with the headline "A year ago, South Carolina celebrated making a bowl; now ‘it’s something we expect’."