Oct. 24—COLUMBIA — Down to its dying breath, the only spark on the match about to be re-thrown under Shane Beamer's chair, needing a break in a season and a stretch long devoid of them and South Carolina nearly throwing away its final chance, too ...
Malik Orsan did what he's here to do, and became a hero.
Orsan drilled a 48-yard walk-off field goal and the Gamecocks beat No. 11 Tennessee 27-24 on Saturday, a win that looked less and less likely until literally the final play.
The Gamecocks (4-3, 2-3 SEC), about to file another one in the Bermuda Triangle of head-scratching USC losses when it had a two-touchdown lead on an SEC opponent at home, somehow got a turnover with seconds to play, survived some play-calling where all they had to do was run the ball and wait for the clock to wind down and got Orsan on for his moment.
USC had a 14-0 lead with 8:17 to go in the first quarter. Then was trailing 24-17 for most of the duration.
But the Gamecocks tied the game, then Dylan Stewart knocked the ball from George MacIntyre's hand to the ground, where Tomiwa Durojaiye dove on it. USC threw the ball twice before LaNorris Sellers scrambled for 9 yards to regain the lost yardage from those two plays and an Emmanuel Kojo Poku false start, at which point Beamer finally burned his last timeout and set up the field goal.
It would have been good from 56 — which it was shaping up to be — and an overjoyed Orsan ran into the waving arms of his teammates as the students stormed the field. That will cost the Gamecocks $500,000 (and new hedges), but nobody minds at present.
Notes
The Gamecocks took a 17-14 lead when a promising drive forced a field goal, set up when Donovan Murph was wide-open in the end zone and Sellers just completely missed him. He threw it so far and away that Tom Cruise should have starred in it.
But before that, USC snapped the ball with 10-15 seconds to go before the two-minute warning would have hit and stopped the clock anyway. Why didn't Beamer use that time and take the automatic timeout and make it harder for the Vols to score if they got the ball back?
Tennessee scored its go-ahead touchdown with 29 seconds left in the half, so perhaps it wouldn't have made that much of a difference.
—The Vols' 14-0 deficit was their largest of the season.
—D.J. Swearinger attended the game. Bennett had an excellent first half. Each are Upstate natives who were originally committed to Tennessee.
—Sellers' first-half interception was his first since the Alabama game, two days from a calendar month ago.
—As good as Kendal Briles has been as USC's offensive coordinator, his fourth-down calls have been miserable. But he lined up under center on Saturday and Sellers ran behind Matt Fuller for a first down. Then Sellers wouldn't release the ball with a man wide-open in the middle and was sacked for a loss in the third quarter.
—Tennessee had three touchdowns called back due to penalties.
Next game
The Gamecocks will kick off at Oklahoma at 4:15 p.m. on Oct. 31.
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