Under new leadership, what happens next for South Carolina’s offensive line?
Shane Beamer pulled out his iPad for a long flight back to Columbia, watching the film of South Carolina’s 20-10 loss to No. 11 LSU.
When the charter plane touched down in Columbia, Beamer’s mind was made up. He called athletic director Jeremiah Donati at 4:18 a.m. Sunday, getting the OK from his boss to fire offensive line coach Lonnie Teasley.
Beamer informed Teasley on Sunday morning, then told tight ends coach and run-game coordinator Shawn Elliott that he’d be taking over the Gamecocks’ offensive line.
Elliott, who served as USC’s offensive line coach from 2012-15, will still have a hand in coaching the tight ends, but that responsibility will largely shift to pass-game specialist Ben Burress.
It seems that Beamer’s airplane film session, rewatching the Gamecocks give up five sacks, was the tipping point in his decision to part ways with Teasley. The wind had been blowing this way for a while.
A banged-up Gamecocks offensive line allowed 41 sacks in 2023, but injuries were much to blame. The Gamecocks again gave up 41 sacks last year, but the young group improved as the season went on and seemed to turn a corner.
“(I) felt like we would take another step and, statistically, we have not been good enough,” Beamer said.
The Gamecocks have allowed 19 sacks this season and, until they ran for 193 yards against LSU, had not shown the ability to produce a consistent rushing attack.
The problem: The Gamecocks’ offensive line has not been healthy. Starters Cason Henry and Nolan Hay missed the LSU game. As did backup Markee Anderson. And starting guard Shed Sarratt was injured early Saturday and didn’t return.
“We had injuries last night and still performed really well in a lot of ways,” Beamer said.
But not well enough to extend Teasley’s tenure. There was just too much ugliness to ignore.
“I don’t think many head coaches make a change when you just had 252 yards rushing (before sacks) that we gained,” Beamer said. “I just look at some of the self-inflicted things that we had on the offensive line. ... There were just a lot of things last night that were not playing winning football.”
Center Rodney Newsom messed up the cadence on the first play of the game, resulting in a fumble. The Gamecocks’ O-line was responsible for a pair of illegal snap penalties and three false start flags. They looked undisciplined and unprepared.
They also failed to hold up consistently enough in pass protection, forcing quarterback LaNorris Sellers to run for his life more often than not.
All of that is to say: There is much to fix with this offensive line, so much that it’s reasonable to wonder how much of an impact a midseason coaching change will have on the group.
“(It’s) a different voice in there that will bring a little different message, way to coach it, whatever,” Beamer said. “We can’t sit here in week seven and make wholesale changes to everything that we’re doing. But we can certainly coach things a little bit differently and handle things a little bit differently during the week.”
Is Elliott’s fiery personality enough to create change? Perhaps. But he also might change how South Carolina handles its personnel.
Take, for example, the center position. Newsom started the game for South Carolina, but was later replaced by Boaz Stanley. Beamer said after the game that the plan going in was to have them in a rotation, which isn’t common for offensive linemen.
Newsom left quickly after a number of mistakes, notably the botched snap. But Stanley wasn’t much better, getting called for a number of penalties.
Maybe Elliott has some quick coaching point that can rapidly improve this offensive line. Maybe he wants to shift where guys play . Or maybe this O-line is something that can’t be fixed until the Gamecocks get healthy.
This story was originally published October 13, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
