Photo courtesy of the University of Auburn
Carolina will play Saturday at Auburn’s iordan-Hare Stadium — which holds 87,451 — where USC has never won.
Gamecocks look to snap road skid
Three-game road losing
streak on line when
USC travels to Auburn
Hiatt Hloore
FOR THE GAMECOCK
If USC’s football team didn’t have
enough things to worry about, then
throw in 87,451 more.
The Gamecock football team has
defeated the Auburn Tigers only once
since it started playing the game. That
was in 1933. To trump that, the
Gamecocks have never won in
Auburn.
USC coach Steve Spurrier has fared
a little better than his new team.
Spurrier has beaten the Tigers in 10 of
the 13 times he has faced them,
including a 4-2 record as the away
team’s coach.
This is a good sign for the
Gamecocks, because playing outside
Williams-Brice Stadium has proven
tough in recent history. USC has a
three-game losing streak on the road
dating back to last year’s game at
Florida. Last season, Carolina had a
3-2 record on the road with wins
against Vanderbilt, Kentucky and
Alabama. In 2003, USC did not win
a single game on the road, and the
Gamecocks are 8-12 while playing as
the visitor in the past five years.
However, the recent slide does not
have the Gamecock players worried.
“I think when you go on the road,
you have less distraction,” junior long
snapper Ike Crofoot said. “You have
their fans cheering for them, and all
we’ve got is ourselves.”
It is not quite that easy playing
SEC road games. Playing in the
conference with one of the largest fan
bases in all of college football,
sometimes coaches prepare players in
different ways.
“Sometimes we go in the stadium
and listen to crowd noise,” Crofoot
said. “When we play Tennessee, we
listen to the Rocky Top song blaring
in the stadium so loud that we can’t
even hear each other talk. We do
whatever it takes to get used to it.”
Neyland Stadium in Tennessee is
the largest stadium the Gamecocks
will play in this season at a capacity of
104,079. The one road game they
have already played was in front of a
crowd approaching 92,000 in a close
17-15 loss at Georgia. Auburn’s
Jordan-Hare Stadium comes in with
87,451, and Arkansas’ Donald W.
Reynolds Razorback Stadium can
hold 71,000.
Before facing a hostile crowd like
the one the Gamecocks will face at
Auburn, coaches try to keep things
routine all throughout the week and
on game day. Unfortunately this will
not be the case because of an injury to
sophomore quarterback Blake
LOSinG STREAK# B3
" ; --
k
Carolina offensive line
shuffles personnel again *
Revolving door turns
as big uglies struggle
to establish run game
(jJBembry
STAFF WRITER
USC’s football team has found
itself in quite the quandary four
games into this early season:
What is the best way to mix and
match a bevy of offensive line
candidates into one effective,
cohesive unit?
Well, for coach Steve Spurrier
and the rest of USC’s coaching
staff, the answers are slow in
coming, and the results are
downright frustrating. The
statistics speak for themselves, as
Carolina’s offensive line has been
largely unable to establish any
kind of dominance at the line of
scrimmage, resulting in a meager
running game and poor time of
possession.
Through four games, USC has
gained 19 first downs on the
ground, while the opposition has
accumulated 45- The
discrepancies get even worse, as
the Gamecocks have racked up
only 262 yards of positive
rushing, while allowing
opponents 796 yards. USG
averages 2.4 yards per carry, but
has also lost 152 yards and has
only three rushing touchdowns.
While these paltry numbers
aren’t encouraging, Spurrier has
said his teams never typically
worry too much about ball 0
control and time of possession.
“I used to not worry about
(time of possession) that much,
because we were, hopefully, a
quick-scoring team. It’s
important to us now because our
defense is not as strong as we
hope it’s going to be some day,”
Spurrier said. “We are giving up a
ton of yards rushing and we are
not making many rushing, so our
time of possession is not going to
be very good. It would be helpful
if the offense could stay out there
awhile and give the defense some
SHUPPLE#B1 |
Katie Kirkland/THE CAMKCOCK W
USC's offensive line has struggled so far, causing frequent changes.
SAT* GMAT* GRE* LSAT* MCAT*
Classroom Online Private Tutoring
Classes conveniently held at USC
800~2Review | PrincetonReview.com
DUtch
Square
Center
www.dutchsquare.com
I ■