‘Very frustrated’: Stunned Gamecocks try to make sense of 4-7 record
As South Carolina football came off the field after a 30-6 loss to Texas A&M on Saturday, there wasn’t much in the way of outward emotion for the Gamecocks — no tears, no fiery words, no slammed helmets.
Inside the locker room at Kyle Field, though, as players processed the defeat and its implications — no bowl game for the first time in four years, the fifth losing season since 2000 and even more pressure on embattled coach Will Muschamp — all the feelings you might expect were there, they said.
They were upset, frustrated, disappointed and stunned.
“Just frustration. Not what we wanted to happen, obviously,” senior running back Rico Dowdle said. “The season ain’t how we wanted it to be. Just frustration, very frustrated.”
The Gamecocks entered the season set to face a brutal schedule rated among the nation’s hardest. Vegas oddsmakers pegged their win total at 5.5 victories in the offseason. And injuries have taken their toll, especially on the offensive side of the ball.
But there was also optimism — Muschamp called the group the deepest and most talented team he’d had in four years at USC. And now, with a bowl game officially out of reach and one final daunting game against Clemson ahead, Carolina’s players are left contemplating how a season that went from disappointing to exhilarating and back again got away from them.
“Everybody’s disappointed,” sophomore linebacker Ernest Jones said. “We’re sitting at 4-7, and there’s no way you could have told us earlier when we were sweating our butts off and just working so hard this summer ... you just couldn’t have told us that we’d be sitting at 4-7, but that’s just the way life is going for us right now.”
If South Carolina loses to Clemson, 2019 would be among the bottom 15 seasons in the 112-year history of the program by winning percentage. In recent history, only the 2015 team that went 3-9 was worse. And fifth-year senior tight end Kyle Markway, who was on that squad, said it’s not fair to compare this year’s team to that one, though that makes the poor results sting a little more.
“It’s frustrating, man, I’ve been through it — 2015 was kind of similar, but this team is different, this team comes and works every day. It’s just frustrating that it’s not paying off for us,” Markway said. “We’re upset, we’re frustrated.”
But Jones, who has emerged as one of the more vocal leaders on the team this year, said he has already gone to work trying to rally and re-energize his teammates as they look to bounce back and at least spoil Clemson’s College Football Playoff hopes.
“I just had to tell them, you know, we’re family. At the end of the day, people are going to try to bring us down and turn us against each other, try to put blame on offense or defense. ... But at the end of the day you gotta block that noise out and just keep playing. We got one more game with each other. And I’m just not ready for it to end,” Jones said.
NEXT
Who: South Carolina vs. Clemson
When: Noon Saturday, Nov. 30
Where: Williams-Brice Stadium
TV: ESPN
This story was originally published November 17, 2019 at 10:35 AM.
