Shane Beamer shouts out Spencer Rattler for full-circle moment after USC’s upset win
Before Spencer Rattler was South Carolina’s starting quarterback, he was Oklahoma’s backup.
He didn’t start his career that way, but Rattler was benched for Caleb Williams last season when the Sooners earned a 55-48 shootout win against Texas.
Oklahoma played the Longhorns again on Saturday, losing 49-0, while Rattler led the Gamecocks to a 24-14 win against Kentucky.
And head coach Shane Beamer let Rattler know about the timing — almost one year to the date of last year’s OU-Texas game — leading into Saturday’s matchup with the Wildcats.
“You call it fate, karma, whatever,” Beamer said in his SEC Network postgame interview. “That’s pretty freaking cool that one year later, the same day that OU plays Texas, he comes up here and leads us to this.”
Rattler was benched on Oct. 9, 2021 and transferred to South Carolina in December. His second-half performance Saturday night helped lead the Gamecocks to its first win against a ranked opponent under Beamer.
Rattler went 8-of-10 passing in the second half, leading three scoring drives for USC.
“It’s crazy how things work,” Rattler told SEC Network. “God does mysterious things.”
That wasn’t the only full-circle moment that took place in Lexington for the Gamecocks.
Beamer was hired by South Carolina on Dec. 6, 2020 — the day after the Wildcats beat the Gamecocks in Kroger Field — and the news of the hire leaked in that game’s final moments.
“Those guys went in the locker room after the game and probably were like, ‘Who in the hell is Shane Beamer?’ ” Beamer said. “Two years later, to come back up here and have arguably the biggest win here in a long, long time is pretty special.”
South Carolina’s win against Kentucky was the first road win for the team this season, and gave Beamer the first three-game winning streak of his career.
This story was originally published October 8, 2022 at 11:18 PM.
