South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer using rankings as motivation

Heading into this fall, expectations are high at the University of South Carolina. The Gamecocks finished strong in 2024 and return some of the country’s top players. With key recruiting wins (both from the transfer portal and the high school ranks), head coach Shane Beamer and his staff believe the 2025 version of their team has a chance to be special.

Some in the media world agree. The Gamecocks earned a No. 13 ranking in the preseason polls from both the AP and the coaches. Some individual voters have even gone as far as to project South Carolina as a College Football Playoff team.

However, others have not been as high on USC. Former Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy and AP voter and On3 national analyst Brett McMurphy each left Carolina off of their top 25 ballots completely. Beamer noticed, and he believes both the lack of recognition from names like McElroy and McMurphy and the challenge of meeting lofty expectations from others could add some fuel to the Gamecocks’ fire this fall.

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During Tuesday’s media availability, the fifth-year head coach answered a question about his team’s spot in the rankings. “Yeah, I mean, I’d rather be ranked high and have those expectations than not,” he stated. He continued, “As a coach, when you’re not ranked high, like we were last year, it’s great because you can use that as fuel and motivation. But we want to be a team that’s consistently ranked high in the top 10, top 15, going into every single season because it means we did some good stuff the year before, and we’re expected to do stuff again.”

Beamer said accepting that challenge is a major step to becoming a real contender in college football. “The best teams in the country, year in and year out, they’re in those preseason rankings every year.” Still, he doesn’t want his team thinking too much of themselves. “All that matters is just what we do from this point forward,” he said. “Now, do I think we’re a good team? Heck yeah. And we also have a lot of work to do.”

When it comes to dealing with negativity, Beamer admitted that the Gamecocks have found some motivation in proving doubters wrong. “We didn’t really listen to it (last preseason) when everybody was telling us how terrible we were,” he began. “Well, maybe a little bit,” he said. South Carolina went on to go 9-3, marking the third time in four seasons that the Gamecocks outperformed preseason expectations.

As that relates to this year’s team, Beamer made mention of the small group of analysts who have excluded his team from preseason rankings. He believes that lack of respect just means his South Carolina squad has more to prove. “We’re ranked 13th…also know there’s some prominent media members that put out their own little polls that we’re not in their top 25, so we’ve still got a lot to prove.”

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