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I . ■ 7 GAME SCHEDULE CONTACT US MEN’S AND WOMEN’S SWIMMING AND DIVING Story ideas? Questions? Comments? VOLLEYBALL vs. Florida, 7 p.m., Friday; E-mail us at gamecocksports@hotmail.com FOOTBALL vs. Florida, 12:30 p.m., Saturday; USC looks to surprise Gators BY JONATHAN HILLYARD THE GAMECOCK For the third straight week, the ^ Gamecocks (5-5,2-5 SEC) will try W to become bowl-eligible with a win against the No. 15 Florida Gators (7-3,5-2) on Saturday at Williams Brice Stadium. The Gamecocks will take on a hot Florida team that’s on a four game winning streak. The streak includes a three-game stretch in which the Gators defeated three top-11 teams in a row—LSU, then No. 11 ranked Arkansas and then No. 4 ranked Georgia. These three teams defeated Carolina by a combined total of 92 20. The streak also put the Gators back at a tie for the SEC lead, but they will need to defeat USC and get a little help from Tennessee and Georgia to reach the SEC championship game. lrue-iresnmau yuaneruacK ^ Chris Leak leads this edition of the ? always-dangerous Florida offense. Leak is now 5-1 as a starter for the Gators and ranks sixth in the con ference in pass efficiency. “Chris Leak is special, and we all knew that coming out of high school,” USC head coach Lou Holtz said in a news release. “He has 60 percent accuracy, great poise, runs the team and has as good a touch on the ball as anyone I have seen.” Including Leak, 14 true fresh men have played for Florida this season. This also includes stand out linebacker Channing Crowder, who ranks second in the SEC in total tackles. Freshmen lead Florida in rushing, passing, kick returns and punting. While the Gators will have all their freshmen weapons at their disposal, the Gamecocks will be without freshman phenom Demetris Summers, who suffered a concussion against Arkansas. Summers’ headaches subsided as of Wednesday’s practice, and he was participating in light running. Summers is also questionable for next week’s game against arch ri val Clemson. Summers’ absence will mean more carries for running backs Daccus Turman and Cory Boyd but also means another shot for Kenny Irons, who has had only one carry since the loss to Georgia. According to Holtz, Irons had a good week of practice and deserves to get some carries. While the shuffling of runners is nothing new for Carolina this season, another offensive change could greatly affect the Gamecocks on Saturday. After quarterback Dondrial Pinkins committed a career-high three turnovers, Holtz said on Monday that another quarterback, whether it be Bennett Swygert or Mike Rathe, will play some against Florida. “You can take that sucker to the bank,” Holtz said. “I don’t care what the score is, what the situa tion is, somebody else is going to play a couple series.” Offensive coordinator Skip Holtz said Wednesday to look for a backup quarterback in the third offensive series. Whoever is under center for USC will have to be sharp against the Florida defense, which is led by former Carolina defensive co ordinator Charlie Strong. Strong spent the previous four seasons at USC under Holtz, in which he produced three defenses that ranked in the nation’s top 30. “USC is a special place for me,” Strong said this week. “Nobody knew who Charlie Strong was until I was at South Carolina. That’s where it all started for me.” Strong’s ultimate goal of be coming a head coach fueled his decision to make the move to Florida last December, since five of Florida’s last seven defensive coordinators have become head coaches. Strong was very popular among the players at Carolina and made a personal phone call to all of his defensive players when he decided to leave for Florida. The toughest part wiu oe standing on the visitors’ side line,” Strong said. His new defense has been playing tremendously well as of late and is lead by a secondary with four senior starters. The de fensive unit is ranked second in the conference in pass defense and is lead by Keiwan Ratliff, who leads the league in inter ceptions with eight. South Carolina has lost 12 straight to Florida and will look to end that streak Saturday at 12:30 p.m. The game will be tele vised regionally by Jefferson-Pilot Sports. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com * Exhibiting a new team W PHOTO BY JOHNNY HAYNES/THE GAMECOCK Newcomer Josh Gonner, who scored 18 points, drives down the court in last night's exhibition game against the Inter Hoop team from Lithuania. The Gamecocks won the contest 81-62. USC will play again Monday against Gardner-Webb In the first game of the season. SPORTS CHALLENGE THE CHALLENGE: The Gamecock’s readers and staff test their sports knowledge with predictions of the weekend’s games. (Rankings are from The Associated Press.) Brad Senklw Sports Editor (64-46) Wes Wolfe Asst. Sports Editor (61-49) Charles Tomlinson Editor in Chief (64-46) Adam Beam Managing Editor (74-36) Shawn Rourk Head Designer (69-41) Michael Shiriey Reader of the Week (61-49) Auburn at 7 Georgia _ Georgia GeorgiaGeorgia Georgia Georgia Georgia 3 LSU at Alabama _LSU _Alabama LSU LSU LSU LSU _ Kansas St. at 18 Nebraska Nebraska Nebraska Nebraska Nebraska Kansas St. Nebraska 19 Minnesota at 20 Iowa Minn. Jowa_ Minn. Jowa_Iowa Minn. 11 Purdue at 4 Ohio St. Ohio St. Ohio St. Purdue Purdue Ohio St. Ohio St. __ ^ 21 Michigan St. at Wisconsin Wisconsin Mich. St. Mich. St. Mich. State Wisconsin Mich. St. * Texas Tech at 6 Texas Texas Texas_Texas Texas Texas Texas N.C. State at13 Florida St Fla. St. Ha. St. Fla. St. Fla. St. Fla. St. Fla. St. Duke at ClemsonClemson Duke Clemson Clemson_Clemson Duke 15 RoridaatUSC USC USC Florida USC USC USC 20-17 27-24 27-10 35-24 26-23 24-21 SPORTS CHALLENGE'S 11TH-WEEK OUTLOOK: Photo Editor Morgan Ford pulled out a big victory, with a 7-3 record, for the selected staff member, keeping Managing Editor Adam Beam and Editor in Chief Charles Tomlinson at bay. Reader of the week Jonathan Couch, who went 6-4, tied the overall bottom spot with Assistant Sports Editor Wes Wolfe, who has fallen drastically in the standings. Wolfe finished at 3-7, while Sports Editor Brad Senkiw only bettered him by one game for the week. Beam continues dominance with only a couple of weeks left in the year. WANT TO BE READER OF THE WEEK? E-mail your selections next week to gamecocksports@hotmail.com. If you’re picked and^hpve the best record, you’ll win a free Gamecock T-shirt and be able to talk all the trash you want. FILE PHOTO BY MARK SCHILLING/THE GAMECOCK USC’s Cory Boyd will be asked to carry more of the load against Florida on Saturday at Williams-Brice Stadium. Two of SEC’s best to take on volleyball team BY WES WOLFE THE GAMECOCK The USC volleyball team (12 14,6-8 SEC) has its work cut out for it this weekend when it plays host to two of the best teams in the SEC, Florida (26-1,14-0) and Georgia (15-12,8-6). Florida, ranked No. 3 in the USA Today/AVCA poll, arrives in Columbia riding a 26-match win streak and an unbelievable 128-match regular-season win streak in conference play. The SEC streak includes Florida’s 3-0 win over Carolina in Gainesville, Fla., on Oct. 26. The Gators’ only loss this season came at the hands of No. 1 Southern Cal, and Florida hasn’t lost a game since the third game of its match with No. 15 Kansas State. Florida shut out its next 25 opponents leading up to the match with USC. These shutouts include wins over ranked opponents like No. 7 UC-Santa Barbara, No. 4 Stanford and No. 20 Minnesota, along with the Kansas State victory. The dominance that the Gators have had over their foes this season cannot be overesti mated. Florida destroyed Auburn in a Sept. 28 match in Gainesville, holding the Tigers to just six points in the third game. Also, the Gators’ SEC win streak is the longest ever in NCAA women’s volleyball, as is Florida’s 76-game win streak, which extends from game four of the Kansas State match. Florida has also won 12 consec utive SEC regular-season championships. Not only have previous Florida teams been good, but this squad has been playing ex ceptionally. The Gators are cur rently hitting .348 as a team on the season, which puts them at a pace to break the school’s sea son hitting record of .318. Individually, outside hitter Aury Cruz broke the school record for aces in the match ' against USC, and middle blocker Batavia Jenkins recently became the second player in Florida history to have 1,000 kills and 500 blocks in a career. Jenkins is out for the season, however, because she injured her right knee in the first game of the Florida-Carolina match in October. Two days after USC plays Florida, Georgia comes to town. The Bulldogs are 4-2 in SEC road matches this year, beating Alabama, Auburn, Ole Miss and Mississippi State in four straight matches. The two losses came as a result of shutouts by Florida and Tennessee in consecutive matches. Georgia has some hope of beating Carolina because it will bring outside hitter Julia Petruschke, who was named SEC Volleyball Player of the Week on Monday, to the match. The sophomore from Germany played excellently in matches against LSU and Arkansas last week. Against LSU last Friday, Petruschke hit 14 kills and had only one error, while against Arkansas she notched her 15th double-double of the year by nail ing 23 kills and getting 10 digs. In Georgia’s 3-1 victory over USC on Oct. 24, Petruschke had 12 kills, six errors, 12 digs and one block. The Bulldogs are coming off a 1-2 homestand going into the match against Carolina, beat ing LSU and then losing to Arkansas and No. 6 Georgia Tech. The 3-0 loss on Wednesday against the highly ranked Yellow Jackets featured tough play by Georgia. Even though the Bulldogs were shut out, they played well enough to win the match, only losing by three points in games two and three. Florida and USC go at it at 7 p.m. tonight, and the Gamecocks take on Georgia at 1:30 p.m. Sunday. These two matches will be the last Carolina plays before the SEC Volleyball Tournament starts in Columbia next week. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksportsfajwtmailcom Football season not over yet, fans JAY POU GAMECOCKSPORTS@HOTMAIL.COM There’s still a lot to play for in last 2 games. With the 2003 USC football sea ' son looking more and more like 2002’s disappointing season, many Carolina fans are starting to lose faith in the Gamecocks. With our last two games against Florida and Clemson, many have already writ ten this season off, expecting an other mediocre 5-7 finish. There’s no need to chalk this season up as a loss. We can beat Florida and Clemson. Everyone knows we’ll give the Tigers all they can handle, but most people are scared stiff of the Florida Gators. After all, you have to go back to 1939 to find the last Gamecock win in the series. Many of you are probably still smarting from the 54-17 thumping the Cocks- - took the last time the Gators came to Columbia. But things have changed. Florida doesn’t dominate the SEC like it did two years ago. Since Steve Spurrier’s departure, the Gators have struggled against op ponents they used to throttle. Just last week they squeaked out a 35 17 win over the lowly Vanderbilt Commodores. In fact of Spurrier’s 12 seasons as "Florida head coach, he only lost three or more games on three occasions, which Zook has already done twice in less than two seasons. This isn’t the same Florida that SEC teams used to have nightmares about. The Gators start a true fresh man at quarterback, for crying out loud. Granted, Chris Leak was one of the top high-school quarter backs in last year’s national re „ cruiting class, but it is still his first year playing in the ultra-tough . SEC. Leak is vulnerable, especial ly if he has to face a hostile crowd ; of83,000 when he steps on the field • Saturday. Let’s help make his first - trip to Williams-Brice look like Quincy Carter’s last. We’ve only lost one game in the Cockpit this year, and that was to an LSU team that deserves to play for the national championship. Remember the thrashing we gave to Virginia? That’s exactly the kind of atmosphere we need Saturday afternoon. as ians, li is our jod to maae it as difficult as we can for the op posing team. If we can help level the playing field with crowd noise and intimidation, the game will come down to a battle of coaching. Even Gamecock fans can have faith in this aspect of the game. Everyone knows the legendary Lou Holtz will out coach Itonny-come-lately any day. There is no reason not to think the Gamecocks will get their first win over the Gators as a member of the SEC this Saturday. We all saw last weekend that a less-tal ented team, such as Clemson, can beat a team that grossly outmatch es it. It all comes down to which team comes prepared to play and which one plays with intensity and confidence. Determination will beat talent every time. Mot ice that l have not guaran teed a Gamecock victory this weekend, nor have I even made a prediction. I just wish to point out to the Gamecock nation that this game is very winnable, and we still have a lot to play for. There’s no need to adopt a perpetual wait-; -j ’till-next-year attitude. Why not this year? There’s no time like the-. present to show the nation that we ! are contenders in the SEC, and we ' are a football power that isn’t sat- -- isfied with losing. ----—» *, Pou is a third-year print journalism student.