Hold up! Who’s South Carolina’s kick holder for the 2025 season?
Before South Carolina can even think about the College Football Playoff, before the Gamecocks can dream of a 10-win season, it has to find Superman’s replacement.
Which, of course, is impossible, but someone has to try.
And apologies to Kyle Kennard and Nick Emmanwori and Demetrius Knight — we’re not talking about you. The Gamecocks’ unsung super-weapon was Kai Kroeger ... the holder.
Kroeger, the punter, was great at South Carolina, but loads of schools claim elite punters. Few, though, mastered the finesse of holding field goals and extra points more than Kroeger.
“We were very spoiled to have Kai,” said South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer.
You think that’s hyperbole? Think we’re making funny jokes about the talent required to catch a spinning football, find the laces in a quarter-second, rotate it in your hands, place it on the precise spot with the perfect angle without any jitters? Ha.
Take it from Gamecocks’ special teams coordinator Joe DeCamillis, who spent 31 years as a special-teams coach in the NFL.
“I would put Kai probably in the top three holders I’ve ever had, and I’m talking about the NFL and forward,” DeCamillis said. “He had excellent hands, but he was also very calm.”
Kickers don’t want sudden movements. They are creatures of habit, bound by their routine and timing. If they’ve got a holder kneeling down with jittery jazz hands, their entire cadence is wrecked.
Kroeger had elite hands, able to snatch any off-target snaps and get them down in time. As the Gamecocks also replace veteran long-snapper Hunter Rogers, it’s worth considering who’s more important: the guy snapping or the guy catching the snaps?
What’s interesting is, DeCamillis didn’t even bring up Kroeger’s arm. Contrary to popular belief, what made Kroeger a holding unicorn wasn’t his ability to pull off fake field goals — like on his touchdown pass against Notre Dame in 2022.
Some schools — notably Georgia with QBs Stetson Bennett and Carson Beck — are so gung-ho about opponents having to think about fake field goals that they make their quarterback the holder.
Granted, South Carolina is giving this a shot and having true freshman Cutter Woods compete for the starting holder job. Woods, it should be known, had never been the holder in his life and went through the Joe-D holding crash course this spring.
“Instead of holding your finger on the top of the ball,” Woods said, “you’re supposed to pinch the top of the sides, which was new to me.”
“He’s kind of natural at it,” Beamer said of Woods’ holding ability
There are a few issues with Woods being the holder, though. First of all, there’s a chance this season could be a redshirt year for Woods. Would South Carolina burn that just for him to hold? Knowing how much Beamer values special teams, maybe.
The more glaring issue, though, is what DeCamillis calls “time on task.” Woods is a quarterback who practices with the quarterbacks. To be a holder means he has to practice holding, which then takes away time he could be practicing quarterback.
“When we’re getting ready for a period, Cutter’s doing 7 on 7,” DeCamillis said. “So that’s an issue with it right there.”
That seems to indicate a holder is most likely to come from South Carolina’s specialist room, narrowing the candidates to: kicker/punter Mason Love, kicker William Joyce, kicker Peyton Argent and freshman kicker Max Kelley.
Naturally, that introduces another logistical conundrum. Unless one of those three guys is suddenly going to master the art of drop-kicking, well, the same person can’t both hold and kick field goals.
In other words: South Carolina needs to find a starting placekicker before it can choose a holder. Of course, the former takes priority over the latter.
“It’s not a question of you wanna win the field-goal battle so you’re not gonna hold as well?” said Joyce, who filled in for Kroeger as the starting holder in the 2022 win over Georgia State. “No, we’re all trying our best to hold well for each other.”
You may be wondering: How on Earth do you hold well?
It means that you know who’s kicking. Because, contrary to every backyard football game ever, you’re not supposed to hold the ball straight up. Kickers are specific about the lean. For instance: Joyce’s preference is a ball tilted both forward and toward the holder.
“Over the years, I feel like more and more goes into it,” Joyce said. “It’s all about getting the field-goal percentage higher.”
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This story was originally published August 6, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
