Collin Hill worked on these two things during South Carolina’s bye week
Coming in as a graduate transfer from a Group of Five school and unseating a incumbent young starter, South Carolina quarterback Collin Hill was always going to face a lot of scrutiny from the Gamecock faithful this season.
And after a lackluster performance against LSU in which Hill completed 12 of 22 passes for 234 yards, a touchdown and an interception, there was plenty of rumblings about the QB position heading into the bye week.
Coach Will Muschamp put that to bed earlier this week, saying Hill remains the team’s No. 1 quarterback, and Hill also gave some indication Wednesday that he spent a good bit of the off week working on the issues that have frustrated the Gamecock offense through five games.
“For me personally, I think it would be probably timing with receivers, just continuing to develop that, and just the mental side of things too,” Hill said of his focus during the bye.
Timing could be especially key with a player like transfer Jalen Brooks, who wasn’t granted a waiver by the NCAA to play until four weeks into the season. As a result, he spent the majority of his time on the scout team, and in his first game of the year against LSU, he and Hill were on either side of a slant route gone awry that resulted in an interception returned for a touchdown. Hill also overthrew an open Brooks on a deep ball that could have been a large gain.
On the mental side of things, Hill spoke specifically about limiting “negative plays.”
“I think about me personally, knowing when to just throw the ball away,” Hill said. “I think I want to, you know, you always want to make a play. And you just can’t take sacks, whether it’s just throwing it away or trying to get up (and run) and get what you can. Minimize negative plays and just try to stay ahead of the chains.”
Hill’s performance under pressure has been a sore spot for fans — he’s taken 16 sacks on the season, most in the SEC and tied for 10th most in the country. Against LSU, he was sacked five times, and after the game, Muschamp laid the blame for two of them on Hill, presumably for not throwing the ball away when the pocket collapsed.
According to SEC Stat Cat, Hill has thrown the ball away four times so far this season, or on 2.56% of his passes. Both of those marks put him around the middle of the pack in the conference. Hill’s not known as much of a scrambler — his three torn ACLs basically preclude that. But he has managed to pick up a few decent runs this season and scored four rushing touchdowns, all while staying healthy.
Regardless of what happens this weekend against No. 7 Texas A&M, though, don’t expect Hill to worry much about what outside voices say of his performance.
“I’m just gonna be real. I don’t read anything, so, you know, no offense to you guys, I’m sure you do a great job of covering all that stuff,” Hill told reporters Wednesday. “Good or bad, it’s just something (where) once I got to college, I never read anything whether it was an article about my family or anything positive or negative. I don’t read anything. So, to me, what happens outside of the building, that doesn’t affect me either way.”
This story was originally published November 5, 2020 at 1:30 PM.
