Why did South Carolina football hire a mental performance coach? Beamer explains
Last November, as South Carolina reached its second bye week 3-6 and sputtering, Shane Beamer spent his Saturday sitting on a beach, calling around to see whether there was someone who could make his team mentally sharper.
A week before, he was on the sidelines in Oxford, watching his football team fumble over its shoes in a loss to Ole Miss. He knew things were off.
“I remember saying to myself like, ‘That’s not him. Something’s going on in there for that guy not to make that play,’” Beamer said Thursday at the Garnet and Black Road Trip in Charleston.
If he needed any more convincing, it came a week later. South Carolina collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut off, blowing a 27-point halftime lead to Texas A&M.
“Just some of the mistakes we made,” Beamer said, “and ultimately that’s on me. But just some of the mistakes we made mentally and physically by older guys, I just said to myself, every professional team, I feel like, has some sports performance-type coach.”
Just over four months later, Beamer found one for his football team. Marius Aleksa comes to Columbia as South Carolina’s “Director of Process Development” after stints as a mental performance coach with the U.S. Army Special Warfare Center and School and MLB’s Miami Marlins.
“I was like, if he can work with the performance aspect of people who are literally risking their lives for our country,” Beamer said, “he can sure as heck work with 18-, 19-year-old football players.”
It should be known: This is not the same as a mental-health professional. Aleksa is not a therapist, though South Carolina’s football players have access to those folks, too.
No, Aleksa is going to be around South Carolina like a regular coach. In the team meetings. At practices. Ready to jump in to talk with a coach or student-athlete about getting the most out of themselves.
That, to Beamer, gives the Gamecocks an edge.
“If it helps LaNorris (Sellers) make a great throw — whatever it is, we all have our processes,” Beamer said. “And (Aleksa) is really good at just helping guys with the processes of stuff.”
