North Carolina beats South Carolina as Gamecocks struggle to block

North Carolina was able to beat South Carolina, 31-17, in a game where South Carolina’s offense did not play well. What can fans take away from the loss?

Spencer Rattler’s stat sheet will look really good with 300+ passing yards but it was a really tough day of work due to the fact that the Gamecocks couldn’t block well. On the other side of the ball, Drake Maye ended up with 269 passing yards and two touchdowns.

The Carolinas started out this game by swapping TD’s after a three-and-out punt by Rattler’s offense. North Carolina was able to get a field goal before another punt by South Carolina. The Tarheels would get another score before a TD response by the Gamecocks.

After Drake Maye led North Carolina down the field for two more scores, that would be it for all of the scoring for the game as South Carolina would have a couple of offensive drives that went completely nowhere in the second half of this game. This includes multiple drives that were lost on downs after Rattler’s offense was unable to get the first.

As pointed out by college football Reddit, (I had the same thought though), South Carolina ran a play that included a route where it was way short of the first down marker. While having one receiver run a route like this might make sense for spacing, having Rattler throw to the receiver was not an ideal outcome.

What can South Carolina fans take away from this loss?

The South Carolina Gamecocks ended up with only four rushing yards through the third quarter. It is pretty hard to win a game when you have that and less than 200 passing yards through three quarters.

For the entire game, South Carolina ended up with only 23 rushing yards after factoring the fact that Rattler ended up with -22 rushing yards due to sacks. They ended up completing over 300 yards of passing but it is really hard to win when the rushing game is completely inexistent.

The offensive line for the Gamecocks is a serious problem. Spencer Rattler got sacked nine times in the game. It is only one game but if the problem persists Rattler will face pressure due to the fact that opposing defenses will not have to prepare for a rushing attack and obviously, the fact that South Carolina can not give Rattler enough time on passing plays.

The Gamecocks had multiple times to make a comeback in the fourth quarter in this game but were unable to due to the offensive line. When in-conference play comes around, that is something that has to change if Shane Beamer wants to be successful this season.

South Carolina made a big jump at the end of last season after beating Tennessee and Clemson in the last two weeks of the regular season. The question will be can the Gamecocks overcome these issues or will they downgrade in wins from last season? Time will only tell.