South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer is aware of the expectations surrounding the Gamecocks headed into the 2025 college football season.
Beamer and Co. posted a 9-4 record in 2024, the best season for the program since former head coach Steve Spurrier led the Gamecocks to a 11-2 finish in 2013.
Last year’s finish paints a brighter picture for the trajectory of South Carolina under Beamer, who had a 20-18 record over three seasons before the promising improvement in Year 4.
Beamer acknowledge the increased expectations for the program this season when speaking with ESPN’s Greg McElroy Monday on “Always College Football.”
And Beamer admitted that it’s something he has been aware of, albeit with caution.
“It’s something that for me personally – I’ve been very cognizant of all the way back to January when we came back to start the spring semester of being on high alert, making sure our guys don’t think that just because it happened last season that it’s going to happen this year,” Beamer said.
South Carolina Gamecocks head coach Shane Beamer
Jeff Blake-Imagn Images
“Because there’s plenty of examples of teams that read their press clippings all summer and then all of a sudden they got to the season and they got their face beat in,” he said.
The Gamecocks had their fair share of losses to the NFL Draft and transfer portal, but there are some notable contributors slated to return. Headlining that group is star quarterback LaNorris Sellers, who took home SEC Freshman of the Year and Freshman All-America honors in 2024.
Defensively, star EDGE Dylan Stewart returns after making his presence known last season, earning Freshman All-America and SEC All-Freshman Team honors.
And South Carolina added a talented supporting cast with a top-20 high school class and the No. 15 transfer class in the 2025 cycle (247Sports).
There’s plenty to like about the group in Columbia, and it appears that Beamer and the Gamecocks are embracing those expectations. The caveat, however, is the potential pitfall of buying into the preseason noise before playing a snap.
“But there’s excitement,” Beamer said. “We embrace those expectations. I want us to be picked high. I want people to have high expectations. There’s no doubt about it. But (we are) being very intentional about the amount of work that went in to 2024 – on and off the field, players, coaches, and staff – and making sure that we’re doing even more of that this year.”
South Carolina is slated to open the 2025 season at Virginia Tech, where Shane Beamer’s father, Frank Beamer, became a coaching legend. That highly-anticipated matchup will take place on Aug. 31.
