Why Shane Beamer says this is ‘the best’ Vanderbilt team South Carolina has faced
South Carolina has won 16 straight games over Vanderbilt, dating back to 2009.
Despite the lopsided history in the series, Shane Beamer isn’t expecting a cakewalk when the two teams play in Williams-Brice Stadium on Saturday (7:45 p.m., SEC Network).
“They’re good … they’re really good,” Beamer told local media Tuesday.
Beamer said he hasn’t thought about the 16-game winning streak over Vanderbilt — the program’s longest win-streak versus any opponent all-time — and hasn’t brought it up to the team. Instead, he’s only emphasized how good the Commodores are this year.
“This year has nothing to do with those previous years,” Beamer said. “I haven’t been around here for every year that we’ve played Vanderbilt, but I’d be hard-pressed to believe that there’s a better Vanderbilt team that we’ve played during that streak than the one we’re going to play Saturday night.”
The last time Vanderbilt beat South Carolina came in 2008 — the second of back-to-back wins in the 2007-08 seasons. Coincidentally, those were the first two seasons of Beamer’s first stint at South Carolina when he was an assistant under Steve Spurrier.
Those two wins also make up half of Vanderbilt’s total wins in the series. South Carolina leads all-time 30-4. Last year, South Carolina traveled to Vanderbilt and beat the then-No. 24 Commodores 28-7 on their home turf in Nashville, Tennessee.
Vanderbilt comes into Saturday’s matchup 2-0 and fresh off a 44-30 win on the road at Virginia Tech. Beamer said this year’s Vanderbilt team has improved from last year in just about all phases of the game and is “certainly the best Vanderbilt team that we’ve played” during his tenure at South Carolina.
“Obviously, (Diego) Pavia, their quarterback, makes them go,” Beamer said. “He brought back all of his top weapons. They went out in the portal and got a couple of receivers that have added an element to their offense. They seem to be more explosive in the passing game than they were last year. And three new offensive linemen that have come in from the other schools as well. ... They’re already a good team that has added to it.”
Vanderbilt’s sixth-year quarterback Diego Pavia, like Beamer said, is a key component to the Commodores offense and has the potential to give South Carolina fits on defense. Last season, Pavia threw for 2,293 yards and 20 touchdowns while adding 801 yards and eight scores on the ground.
Through two games in 2025 Pavia has already compiled 573 total yards and five touchdowns, including 193 passing yards and two touchdowns against Virginia Tech. Beamer said one way to slow down Pavia is to simply keep Vanderbilt’s offense — which allowed Virginia Tech to run six offensive plays in the third quarter last week — off the field.
“It’s going to take all 11 on defense to control him on Saturday night,” Beamer said. “All of us flying to the ball, it starts up front, but we’ve got to do a great job on the perimeter, without a doubt. ... In order to control Pavia we’ve got to do our part on offense too, to make sure that we’re staying on the field and sustaining drives.”
Beamer said Vanderbilt’s “explosive passes” and an offense that appears to be more aggressive so far this season than it was in the past has stuck out as a difference when watching film.
“They look even more confident than what they did last season, and they should,” Beamer said. “They all played a lot of football last season and won a lot of games. But that’s the biggest thing that jumps out to me, is just the the ability to make big plays in the passing game on the outside. And they had good receivers, don’t get me wrong, last year. But this year, they’re a year older, they’ve added a couple guys to it and they seem even more willing to take those shots down the field.”
South Carolina is a 5.5-point favorite in game.
This story was originally published September 10, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
