How one mistake could prove to be valuable lesson for South Carolina star freshman

South Carolina’s football game at Kentucky was in one of those twilight moments.

It was close enough, 14 points, that one stop and one good drive would have USC within a score. Not an ideal position, but just short of a stage of desperation.

With 14 minutes and 15 seconds left in the fourth quarter, the Gamecocks got that stop. And then they gave it back.

After stuffing Benny Snell to force fourth and 8, freshman defensive back Jaycee Horn got into it with the prolific Kentucky runner. Out came the flag, 15 yards and the Wildcats got to take another three minutes off the clock.

Horn is one of USC’s brightest young stars, a true freshman seeing a lot of work at nickel and corner. But that moment was a lesson.

“He learned a lot,” senior linebacker Bryson Allen-Williams said. “Just talking to him on the sideline. He understood that’s something you can’t do. That was a big play in the game, a big penalty.”

It easily could’ve cost the Gamecocks points, as it moved the ball to the USC 20. But a pair of Kentucky penalties pushed the Wildcats out of field goal range, and a third-and-40 interception pinned USC on its 9.

That glaring moment was just part of a miscue-filled day on both sides of the ball. The defense had plenty of blown assignments, moments when players freelanced instead of doing their assignments, plus missed tackles. The offense had drops and some penalties of its own.

“It’s not just Jaycee,” Allen-Williams said. “He’s not the only person that made a mistake. All of us, everybody up here including me made mistakes. We’ve got to continue to get better.

“That’s the thing that we’ve got to go into this week. We’re not where we want to be.”