Elijah Campbell and Jack Veltri react after the Gamecocks 23-19 season opening win over Old Dominion

well it wasn't pretty but it's a win the Gamecock survive a scare from Old Dominion 23-19 offense nowhere to be found defense looking pretty good I'm Elijah Campbell from the postgame show 1075 the game My Man Jack vry from Gamecock Central here to try to make some sort of sense over what in the world we watched on the field tonight look Jack I know we talked about you've been on our show plenty of times man I think we both hypothesized that this game was going to start slow offensively because there were so many unknowns you have all these new receivers there's not a true number one that has emerged the entire you know two weeks of Camp going into this first game I just didn't think it would result in what we saw tonight with the offensive futility because if the defense that Force four turnovers the defense do Force two of them inside the 6yd line you don't score any of those touchdowns tonight and you get beat by old the minion that's the thing man it's like if you don't get the the play that you got from the defense tonight this might be an entirely different game I at one point South Carolina was trailing Midway through the fourth quarter and it took a few nice heroic plays from this defense in od old minion territory to get out of it here with a win and look the offense really just wasn't what you thought it might be obviously first game these things happen but the fact that they were just so riing on running the ball and not able to get much going in the passing game was a concern for me and it honestly makes sense because you look back at Camp I mean Dow and straight up said no one has been able to separate themselves in that receiving room you saw it out here tonight only uh you know Lenor sers really couldn't get much going passing he had well under 200 yards and he had to run pretty much all night long and that's the name of the game for this South Carol offense they're going to run the football a lot this year now can they fix that moving forward of course but I think it's going to take a little more time than maybe we think yeah it just might which unfortunately time is not a luxury that you have next week you got to go on the road to Lexington Kentucky and that's the team that's got two interior defensive linemen that are as good as anybody in the SEC with Octavius oxendine and Darius or U Don Walker but I mean we go back it's the offense too at the beginning of the game you had some sacks some trouble picking up blitzes I think that was one of the worst things like when I saw Jack uh when it CES to either the offensive line or what Shane Beamer kind of pointed out to as the perimeter blocking they didn't pick up blitzes really well and I thought for an offensive line that had some key additions and that we you know could sense a little bit of improvement from coming from last year to this year I thought Old Dominion was able to get way too much pressure and that and along with Lenor sellers having to have 22 carries just doesn't feel very sustainable and is a sign of concern I think we knew that Old Dominion was going to bring a heavy Blitz and be able to stop the run a little bit now South Carolina's offensive line did no favors right Josiah Thompson there were many times when he looked like a freshman out there when he got beat off the ball and just looked like a high school offensive lineman that can't block and I'm not saying that's what he is he's going to be fine but it for his first game it went for just about in general for any of the newcomers it went about as expected you know the worst case scenario now that said while they were bad on the perimeter they did a lot of good things Shane Beamer said it went you know better than maybe a lot of people are going to think and there's a reason why rocket Sanders had holes to run I think South Carolina did a fine job when it came to creating some Lanes to run but on the perimeter like you said it was bad it's not even just the offensive line Beamer basically called out the wide receivers and tight ends for not blocking without saying any names or anything it's true if you can't block out there at receiver and tight end how are you going to be able to make plays it's you can't B anything on outside at that you're all in between the tackles so there's a lot of issues you could take away from this game but I think mainly it's not all on the offensive line despite how bad things were at times on the permer but you got to be better just in general with your receivers blocking your tight ends it's not just all on the offensive line yeah and uh we'll go and look at Rocket Sanders I mentioned some of the TR like troubles trying to bounce things out on the outside I mean 24 carries netted 88 yards scored the the first touchdown of the the game early on when the defense forced that turnover what was kind your evaluation of him I think he looked fine he broke a lot of tackles I thought he looked just as elusive as he did um whenever he was in Arkansas I think we kind of got like a good version of Rocket tonight I just think kind of like the one thing I do agree with with Shane's evaluation the most about this game is that if he got better blocking on the outside then maybe that 88 yards that he netted turns into 110 115 and if you can tighten that up uh that's going to be how you're going to have to run this offense because with you know only what 23 passing attempts and over 50 plus rushing attempts with a a quarterback like sellers who can scoot I think they showed us tonight what they think the strengths of this offense are going to be notice how we didn't see many running backs or many run plays designed for anyone but but s Sanders and sers right yeah you look at Oscar adway he I don't see any stats for him on here Jared Brown has got some rushing stats but the point is this offense relied heavily on Rocket Sanders and Lenor sers to run the football and Lenor sellers running 22 times is a whole different story but rocket running 24 times for 92 yards very impressive that is what you expect from a guy like that and look I if I had to grade his performance I would give it probably like a like a B+ I think it I think it's fair because there's room to grow he had some nice breakout carries but then there were some where he just got stuffed at the line so I think some of the carries that he had went for like 20 something yards inflated how the night looked for him but there were some times where he just wasn't able to get a big breakage and make a big play but overall for his first game for his first real highlight performance in over two years it was pretty solid and you know we'll go ahead and get some of the some of the pluses of this game too I don't want to do this whole video cuz it sounds like it's demon glim because it was a it wasn't a pretty game and you you should want to beat old minion by more than that but the defense I thought Kyle Canard Dylan Stewart highlights of the game those guys uh combined for for multiple sacks and Kyle Canard and Dylan Stewart like you know Kyle Canard helped force that first fumble uh that set up the first touchdown Dylan Stewart punched the ball out when ODU was backed up in their own territory that set up the second touchdown that ultimately was the winning touchdown but when you watch those two guys on the edge if they look like anything they're going to do tonight this defense can have a potential to be pretty special they are scary man you know I I think we knew Dylan Stew was going to be nasty and people were saying like he's going to have like two three sacks tonight I'm like okay I I I could see it but I'm not sure if I fully believe it yet cuz it's like he's a freshman who knows how much he's going to get in there he's not listed as a starter and then he goes out there and does that you know JT unlockable unlock JT gear was listed as a starter tonight and it's like not to say he didn't make an impact but it felt like he did nothing compared to what uh you know Dylan Stewart and um Kyle Canard did it was insane I mean Kyle Canard just right from the jump was all over the field making the big plays forcing fumbles he forced two fumbles tonight had four and a half tackles for a loss and the two and a half sacks just an unbelievable stat line he had only six sacks last year and I say only that's still a lot but I mean he's already halfway to his total from last year that's crazy so these two off the edge are going to be a nightmare for def or for offenses to stop it does feel like that is the Silver Lining from tonight once again South Carolina starts their season with a close and uncomfortable win 23 to9 all next week we're going to be giving you all the coverage leading up to the Kentucky game which is going to be a mammoth on the road in Lexington but for now we got to lot a lot to unpack here at Willie be and we're going to be doing that all next week 1075 the game give us calls give us text 803 404 6100 tweet at us at 10 75 the gamer comment at the game TV I'm Elijah Campbell he's Jack veltry we'll be talking to you a lot starting on Monday with reaction see you then