Sept. 29, 2009
Head Coach Steve Spurrier met with the media Tuesday afternoon to preview the Gamecocks’ game against South Carolina State. The Gamecocks and Bulldogs will kick off at 7 p.m., and the game will be broadcast by ESPN Classic.
Opening Comments
“South Carolina State is a very good team. They went 10-2 last year and are undefeated this year. Watching them on tape they look pretty good. They have good athletes at all the positions. They’re a well-coached team. Buddy Pough and his staff do a super job down there.”
On injuries
“Last week Travian Robertson was our lone injury. We’re certainly going to miss him. He played very well at defensive tackle. He’s one of the strongest players on our team so we’ll miss him, and hopefully the next guy in there can fill his spot and we can continue on. It should be a good game this week. We’re looking forward to it.”
On SC State
“They have a lot of schemes. They’re a little different than they were two years ago. To me it’s a lot like playing an SEC school.”
“We go one game at a time. On your record they all count exactly the same. We’re trying to play a lot better than we played last week, especially on offense. We have a lot of areas that need to improve to have a good season. If we were playing Florida, Alabama or South Carolina State, we would have the same practice schedule and the same intensity.”
“I know they have the quarterback from Gaffney who was a heckuva high school player. I watch mostly their defense; they won 10 games last year (and) won their conference. Those guys are used to wining. They’ll come in here ready to beat us. We’ll get their best shot, we know that.”
On improvements
“We’re going to try to play a lot better. Offensively we had a lot of problems last week, and hopefully we can line up and look like we know what we’re doing and not have a lot of bad plays.”
On players improving
“Every game has its own individual part to it. Last week was a defensive game. We just have a lot to coach about. We’re trying to get better. We’re not going to contend with who our best players are right now. We had some guys who had a (great) game last week that may not play this week. We don’t know yet.”
On upsets nationally by FCS teams recently
“There are good teams everywhere. Anything can happen. There are so many good athletes on all these teams with good speed. “
On the offensive line
“Some of the guys played well. T.J. Johnson played well in there. We need to keep trying some other guys. We have a walk-on here, Garrett Chisolm, that we’re going to take a look at (this week). He’s a big, strong young man. No. 77 – he may be out there playing this week. We’ll try to see what he can do today and go from there. We’ll probably play eight or nine offensive linemen this week and keep letting them all play. Right now T.J. Johnson has graded out higher than the other guys. Garrett Anderson played well last week and Lemuel Jeanpierre was pretty solid as well.”
On team leadership
“Our captains have shown outstanding leadership. I say that because they’ve played well. Cliff Matthews and Eric Norwood are our defensive captains. We read off the list of players who have had outstanding games, and those are the two on defense. Patrick DiMarco and Moe Brown on offense are the one’s who’ve had games. When your captains play well, they have a chance to be good leaders for you.”
On red zone offense
“Our touchdown productivity is terrible. I don’t like it worse than you don’t like it. We’ll try not to have any touchdown’s called back this game…when we do our QB sneak we can’t (seem to get) the guy set down there. We’re still figuring out maybe we can’t hurry up and go because maybe our guys won’t set. We’ve had a crucial penalty two times down there now … we need some better plays down there too, it’s not all on (the players).”
“I look forward to a big crowd. Our fans were super last week and I’m sure they will be this week.”
Player Quotes
Senior defensive tackle Nathan Pepper
On playing last week following injury
“I was hurting through a lot of my rehab (last week), but I knew I was going to play (vs. Ole Miss). I had to play.
On the defense
“This past game I think our defense was the best it’s been all year, especially on third downs. I think our defense is going in the right direction.”
“I think our defense and offense are doing a lot better right now than they were last year. We are doing a better job of taking care of the ball and we are starting to make better plays with it this year. It feels like we have a better hold on what’s going on right now.”
On this week’s game vs. South Carolina State
“This week we have to go in the same as we would if we were playing a top five team. We just need to go in and perfect it and play a little better than we did last week. We just have to stay away from the penalties and mistakes and just try to be perfect.”
Junior safety Chris Culliver
On being an upperclassman
“I feel like I’ve matured a lot since I was a freshman and so has the team. We have a lot of good leaders on the team who are helping us out with a lot of things.”
On this week’s game vs. SC State
“We will look at [SC State] the same way we looked at Ole Miss and Georgia. A lot of those players could have been SEC players and they want to prove they can beat us. They are as capable of beating us as anyone else is.”
Senior wide receiver Moe Brown
On the team’s focus
“Right now we need to focus on SC State, pull out a good win. They have a defense that can fly around the field, get to the ball in great pursuit.”
“We want to finish every game and finish the season. Focusing on finishing each game will help us finish with a good season.”
On the offense
“We have a lot of good plays, a lot of big plays. That was something that was missing last year. As far as offense, we have definitely taken a step in the right direction. The frustration is coming from our play in the red zone.”
