Beamer: South Carolina football has ‘no ceiling’
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Chris Low
ATLANTA — Shane Beamer has answered the question so much that he marked through it on his talking points sheet Monday at SEC media days.
For the umpteenth time, he’s adamant there is no ceiling for South Carolina football.
“I literally have it written down right here, but crossed it out because I say it every year, that there is no ceiling,” Beamer said as he thumbed through his notes. “But, no, I believe that and say it all the time. I get it. We don’t have double-digit national championships like some of these places have and maybe aren’t considered to have the tradition of other places.
“But when I look around at our place, I say, ‘OK, what do we not have that we need to win at the highest level?'”
In his opinion, there’s nothing, and he said the resources and facilities at South Carolina are even better than when he was there as an assistant under Steve Spurrier from 2007-10.
Entering his fifth season with South Carolina, Beamer led the Gamecocks to six straight wins to end the regular season a year ago, including a thrilling comeback 17-14 win at No. 12 Clemson — South Carolina’s second win over its archrival in the past three years. The Gamecocks’ 9-4 finish could have been better if not for losses to Alabama and LSU by a combined five points.
For perspective, Beamer and Spurrier are the only two coaches at South Carolina, over the past 40 years, to win at least nine games in the regular season.
“If you look at what South Carolina has done over the years, it’s very average in a lot of ways, but I’m not worried so much about what’s happened in the past,” Beamer said. “I’m looking at what we can do in the future and the resources that we have now. Every time I go in that stadium, I see Steve Spurrier’s name for all-time coaching wins … and I think about the fact that he had three straight seasons of 11 wins. That was not that long ago, and then it slipped a little bit. But we ain’t that far off either. We’ve closed ground, there’s no question, since I got hired in 2021.”
Redshirt sophomore LaNorris Sellers returns as one of the most talented quarterbacks in the country. He turned down a reported $8 million deal in the offseason to remain at South Carolina. Having grown up in the state, he has also heard talk about the Gamecocks never realistically having a chance to be in the title picture.
His response was short and sweet.
“I mean, we were like five plays off from being in the playoff last year,” Sellers said. “There’s no telling, with how we finished the season last year, how it would have ended for us in the playoff. So I mean, if we could get those five plays back and do it again, I guarantee you we probably could [win a title], and I think we can make a run with this team. We have the players, the people in the community, coaching, the staff, everything to do it.”
Beamer acknowledged that it makes his blood boil any time he hears somebody say South Carolina will never win a championship. The Gamecocks have made the SEC championship game only once (2010) since joining the league in 1992, and that was under Spurrier.
“But we got to the cusp of the playoff a year ago and with a young team,” Beamer said. “This isn’t a flash in the pan. I mean, we’re built to sustain for the future.”
And in this new era of revenue sharing and outside NIL available to players, Beamer thinks that schools like South Carolina can benefit — but with a caveat.
“If everybody has rev share and the number is what it is for everybody in the country, and then anything on top of that is true NIL, then yes, I believe it can help,” Beamer said. “If it’s still the wild, wild west where anybody can do whatever they want and nothing’s enforced, then probably not.”
Nick Barrett, a fifth-year senior defensive tackle, said one of the surest signs that South Carolina is built to last and will find its way into the title picture is the way the Gamecocks bounced back from a 5-7 finish in 2023.
“I feel like with an average program, it would just keep going downhill. They wouldn’t be able to handle the adversity, and that’s one thing you got to be able to handle in life is adversity,” Barrett said. “You got to be able to persevere and respond to adversity, and that’s what we did last year.
“People talk about a ceiling. There’s no ceiling. When people say stuff like that, we just go out there and prove them wrong.”
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Adam Rittenberg
BOULDER, Colo. — Colorado coach Deion Sanders said he feels “healthy and vibrant” after returning to the field for preseason practices after undergoing surgery to remove his bladder after a cancerous tumor was found.
Sanders, 57, said he has been walking at least a mile around campus following Colorado’s practices, which began last week. He was away from the team for the late spring and early summer following the surgery in May. Dr. Janet Kukreja, director of urological oncology at University of Colorado Cancer Center, said July 30 that Sanders, who lost about 25 pounds during his recovery, is “cured of cancer.”
“I’m healthy, I’m vibrant, I’m my old self,” Sanders said. “I’m loving life right now. I’m trying my best to live to the fullest, considering what transpired.”
Sanders credited Colorado’s assistant coaches and support staff for overseeing the program during his absence. The Pro Football Hall of Famer enters his third season as Buffaloes coach this fall.
“They’ve given me tremendous comfort,” Sanders said. “I never had to call 100 times and check on the house, because I felt like the house is going to be OK. That’s why you try your best to hire correct, so you don’t have to check on the house night and day. They did a good job, especially strength and conditioning.”
Colorado improved from four to nine wins in Sanders’ second season, but the team loses Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter, the No. 2 pick in April’s NFL draft, as well as record-setting quarterback Shedeur Sanders, the son of Deion Sanders. The Buffaloes have an influx of new players, including quarterbacks Kaidon Salter and Julian “Ju Ju” Lewis, who are competing for the starting job, as well as new staff members such as Pro Football Hall of Fame running back Marshall Faulk, who is coaching the Buffaloes’ running backs.
Despite the changes and his own health challenges, Deion Sanders expects Colorado to continue ascending. The Buffaloes open the season Aug. 29 when they host Georgia Tech.
“The next phase is we’re going to win differently, but we’re going to win,” Sanders said. “I don’t know if it’s going to be the Hail Mary’s at the end of the game, but it’s going to be hell during the game, because we want to be physical and we want to run the heck out of the football.”
Sanders said it will feel “a little weird, a little strange” to not be coaching Shedeur when the quarterback starts his first NFL preseason game for the Cleveland Browns on Friday night at Carolina. Deion Sanders said he and Shedeur had spoken several times Friday morning. Despite being projected as a top quarterback in the draft, Shedeur Sanders fell to the fifth round.
“A lot of people are approaching it like a preseason game, he’s approaching like a game, and that’s how he’s always approached everything, to prepare and approach it like this is it,” Deion Sanders said. “He’s thankful and appreciative of the opportunity. He don’t get covered in, you know, all the rhetoric in the media.
“Some of the stuff is just ignorant. Some of it is really adolescent, he far surpasses that, and I can’t wait to see him play.”
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Adam Rittenberg
LSU starting quarterback Garrett Nussmeier aggravated the patellar tendinitis he has been dealing with in his knee but will not miss any significant time, coach Brian Kelly said Friday.
Kelly dropped in ahead of a news conference Friday with offensive coordinator Joe Sloan to tell reporters that Nussmeier did not suffer a severe knee injury or even a new one. According to Kelly, Nussmeier has chronic tendinitis in his knee and “probably just planted the wrong way” during Wednesday’s practice.
Nussmeier ranked fifth nationally in passing yards (4,052) last season, his first as LSU’s starter, and projects as an NFL first-round draft pick in 2026.
“It’s not torn, there’s no fraying, there’s none of that,” Kelly said. “This is preexisting. … There’s nothing to really see on film with it, but it pissed it off. He aggravated it a little bit, but he’s good to go.”
Kelly said Nussmeier’s injury ranks 1.5 out of 10 in terms of severity. Asked whether it’s the right or left knee, Kelly said he didn’t know, adding, “It’s not a serious injury. Guys are dealing with tendinitis virtually every day in life.”
LSU opens the season Aug. 30 at Clemson.
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