Shane Beamer Discusses Need For Stronger Ground Attack

South Carolina's Football is thriving in terms of their passing game offensively, but they need to fix their run-game issues in order to help the rest of the team.

Through three games in the 2023 season, Shane Beamer's South Carolina Gamecocks are averaging 53 rushing yards per game, the fourth-worst mark in the country, and 1.8 rushing yards per carry, the third-worst mark in the country. Obviously, these are not the kind of numbers that any football team wants to put up, especially one with the slogan "Run the ball and stop the run" plastered on team meeting walls.

An inability to run the football can also cause issues for other areas of the team. It can put an unworldly amount of pressure on a quarterback like Spencer Rattler and on a defense dealing with new rules that makes time of possession more valuable in today's college game. On Tuesday, Beamer was peppered with questions about the importance of fixing these ground game woes, and he was blunt with his overall assessment, starting with the defense.

"It's important. It's something that even going back [to] last week, I had conversations with Dowell Loggains and Clayton White, like how do we play this game," Beamer recalled. "We certainly have to help our defense. One, [the] defense has got to get off the field on third down. Two, we've got to stay on the field offensively on third down. Three, we've got to play other players on defense because we can't ask Debo [Williams] and Stone [Blanton] to play 80 plays every game at linebacker. We can't ask Marcellas [Dial], O'Donnell [Fortune], Jalon [Kilgore], DQ [Smith], and Nick [Emmanwori] to play every play at safety or corner and nickel. We've got to continue to develop depth."

Beamer then turned the conversation to the offensive side of the ball after being asked about the run game once again and made it clear that while they must get more life out of the ground attack, they don't need to change their entire offensive strategy to make that their sole focus.

"It's critical to help the passing game," Beamer lamented. "[However], we're gonna do what we have to do to win football games every single week, and if that means throwing [the ball] 50 times and running it 10 [times], then that's what we'll do - But we certainly got to get that running game on track," Shane continued. "We've talked about it as a staff; we've got to get the run-game going, and [I'm] confident that we will to one, help the defense, and two, help the passing game."

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