The highs, lows of the Gamecocks defense: A five-year difference across Muschamp era
What happened to South Carolina’s defense Saturday night in Williams-Brice Stadium wasn’t particularly the fault of the players who were out there.
They gave their effort. For the most part they got pushed around by a superior Georgia team. Even at the best programs in the country, a lot of third- and fourth-stringers will get pushed around by a good team.
This has been a year from hell for the Gamecocks on that side of the ball, to say the least. It’s worth acknowledging who was missing Saturday for USC as Georgia put up 332 rushing yards on 7.2 yards a carry and scored seven times on its first nine drives.
Take a look at the season’s opening depth chart, and the names missing on Saturday included:
▪ Three starting defensive linemen, J.J. Enagbare, Keir Thomas, Aaron Sterling, with the fourth Jabari Ellis playing out of position.
▪ The Nos. 1, 2 and 3 Buck defensive ends — Enagbare, Brad Johnson, Jordan Burch.
▪ Two starting linebackers in Johnson and Sherrod Greene, and backup Jahmar Brown at the beginning of the game. Then starter Ernest Jones got hurt Saturday. (That position also had a talented option in Rosendo Louis Jr. injured most or all of the season, and Brown missed most of it.)
▪ Three secondary starters — Jaycee Horn, Israel Mukuamu and R.J. Roderick — who all opted out after Will Muschamp’s firing, from a group that rapidly started looking thin in the first few games.
At points, the team had a freshman and walk-on freshman together at linebacker (and another walk-on chipped in). The team started a former walk-on at safety and had a running back helping at the position. A former starting offensive lineman got work at defensive tackle, along with a pair of guys who have hardly played this season.
That level of injuries would hurt most teams most seasons, but to a degree it represents a failed promise of the Muschamp era.
When the now-departed coach arrived, he said he was the sort who could sell ice to Eskimos. He disdained recruiting rankings, saying he was confident in his staff’s own evaluations.
The hope might not have been a defense as star-studded as Ellis Johnson’s best USC units (teams starting three NFL Pro Bowlers like Stephon Gilmore, Melvin Ingram and Jadeveon Clowney), but perhaps a group with strong depth all around.
And in Year 5, even when the injuries weren’t as widespread, the defense was still thin, still had a range of issues and seemed to lose a little of the gritty magic it had early in the Muschamp tenure.
It’s a long time to look back, but his first group in Columbia was painfully low on pieces, and it was crafted into something solid. The last Muschamp defense, with five years of recruiting, had a few more pieces, but they just didn’t fit.
Consider what Steve Spurrier left.
The secondary for Muschamp’s 2016 season had a starting corner (Al Harris) quit in training camp, pushing a sophomore (Rashad Fenton) into the lineup with junior college transfer Jamarcus King and a corner (Chris Lammons) who Muschamp called out early that season (Lammons eventually rounded into a borderline NFL guy). That team needed six starts from junior college safety Steven Montac, who arrived in the middle of camp.
The linebackers were a sometimes defensive end (Bryson Allen-Williams), a redshirt senior in T.J. Holloman and a thumper in Jonathan Walton. Skai Moore missed the season with an injury. The defensive line was low on star power and had to get the most from some underrated pieces.
The group had one future NFL Draft pick and sophomore first-year starter (Fenton) and a pair of players (Taylor Stallworth, Lammons) who found bit roles in the pros while bouncing around.
And from that, the Muschamp staff managed to wring a defense that came in at 40th and 50th nationally in a pair of advanced ratings. It was 43rd in points-per-drive allowed and 59th in yards-per-play allowed.
That doesn’t seem like much, but considering the talent at hand, it was quite a feat. The defense grew more solid in 2017, showed cracks with injuries in 2018 and was notably better than its numbers in 2019.
That brings us to 2020. The Gamecocks lost three defensive line starters (Javon Kinlaw, DJ Wonnum, Kobe Smith) plus a nice middle linebacker (TJ Brunson). They also returned a set of talented defensive backs (Horn and Mukuamu), had a lot of well-rated defensive linemen (Zacch Pickens, Jordan Burch and Rick Sandidge) and a pair of experienced linebackers (Ernest Jones and Sherrod Greene).
USC’s national defense ranking by SP+ (with points per drive allowed vs FBS in parenthesis):
- 2016: 50th (43rd)
- 2017: 37th (44th)
- 2018: 40th (86th)
- 2019: 30th (44th)
- 2020: 89th (109th)
Whatever spark and gumption got the Gamecocks do to more with less those first two years, it wasn’t there in 2020.
The start was inauspicious, allowing 6.1 yards a play and 31 points to a Tennessee team we now know is bad. Florida could be written off, as could Vandy, and the Auburn game was solid despite some breakdowns on the ground, all things considered.
Then things just collapsed against LSU, Texas A&M and Ole Miss. That’s three of the five worst defensive games (in yards-per-play allowed) of the Muschamp era all in a row.
In some ways, the sport changed on Muschamp. Offenses are more explosive than even five years ago. You didn’t see powder kegs like Ole Miss back then.
Florida was running grinding Jim McElwain schemes rather than Dan Mullens’ versatile spread. But in 2016 USC did manage to hold down a Texas A&M offense with some pieces (more of an open spread than this year’s Aggies) and took advantage of Georgia five-star QB Jacob Eason.
Maybe there are fewer places to hide, but whatever that defensive gumption was, that thing that helped Muschamp’s defenses overachieve to start his tenure, that dissipated — and the depth and talent never caught up to keep things going.
This story was originally published November 30, 2020 at 12:27 PM.
