One Gamecock makes ESPN all-bowl team, and he’ll be back next season

There were 78 teams playing in bowls across nearly a month of football, with hundreds of players posting strong performances.

And according to ESPN’s Mark Schlabach, South Carolina football got one of the best.

He put South Carolina linebacker T.J. Brunson on his all-bowl team, a group of 26 players who excelled in college football’s postseason. The sophomore piled up numbers in USC’s 26-19 win against Michigan in the Outback Bowl.

“Brunson had 13 tackles -- including nine solos -- with two sacks on third down,” Schlabach wrote. “The Gamecocks forced five turnovers, the most in Outback Bowl history, and limited the Wolverines to only 13 points on six red zone trips, which enabled them to come back from a 16-point deficit.”

Those sacks each ended Michigan drives, part of a first-half defensive effort that saw the Wolverines go three and out five times and score only nine points on nine possessions.

Brunson, a Richland Northeast alum, finished as USC’s second-leading tackler with 88 stops. He had 4 1/2 for loss, two sacks, a pair of hurries and three fumble recoveries, one for a touchdown.

He’ll be a centerpiece next season, as the Gamecock lose only Skai Moore and add Bryson Allen-Williams back into the fold of a linebacker group returning most of its contributors.

This story was originally published January 10, 2018 at 1:23 PM with the headline "One Gamecock makes ESPN all-bowl team, and he’ll be back next season."