South Carolina gets boatraced by Clemson

The South Carolina Gamecocks were four-touchdown underdogs against the Clemson Tigers on Saturday. Turns out, they wound up losing by five.

The Tigers boatraced the Gamecocks 38-3 in SC’s home dwelling in Columbia, as the Tigers had little effort in disposing them to improve to 12-0 on the year. The win seals up yet another undefeated regular season for the Tigers, and means that they’ve won their last 27 games in a row.

South Carolina couldn’t quite stop Trevor Lawrence, who used his arm and his legs to trounce them. Lawrence went 26-for-36 on passes for 295 yards. He threw three touchdowns, two to Tee Higgins and one to Justyn Ross. Lawrence also ran for 66 yards on eight rushing attempts, good for a mark of 8.3 yards per carry.

Running the ball was also an effective measure overall for Clemson. The Tigers rushed for 211 yards on 40 carries, good for a mark of 5.3 YPC. They scored two touchdowns, both credited to Travis Etienne, who was third on the team in rushing yards on the day. Lyn-J Dixon outdid him with 60 yards of his own, as he averaged a crisp five yards per carry.

For the Gamecocks, well... this went about as expected. The team rushed for 2.7 yards per carry on 26 attempts. Tavien Feaster led with 47 yards on 12 attempts against his own team. Ryan Hilinski passed for just 105 yards on a 16-for-27 mark, with one interception into the hands of Clemson’s Derion Kendrick. They were outdone in total yards 527-174, 30-9 in first downs, converted on just 1/3rd of their third downs, had just 3.3 yards per play and 6.6 yards per completion. They lost in TOP and the turnover battle, as well. So, yeah. There’s no real shame in losing to Clemson in this fashion. But this was an obviously poor performance.

South Carolina won’t be bowling this year, as they finish the season 4-8. So it’ll be a long, long offseason down in Columbia as they try to pick up the pieces from this season.