It’s been a tough year for Shane Beamer and the South Carolina football team. 

The Gamecocks went on the road to Oxford to play Ole Miss, looking for a spark to inspire a late-season run.

Instead, the team left with a 30-14 loss and an opening at the offensive coordinator spot. Less than 24 hours after the game, Mike Shula was relieved of his duties. 

“Frankly, it just hasn’t worked like I wanted it to work,” Beamer said of Shula’s firing. “We all have a hand in it, players and coaches. We all have to be better, but just did not like the way we were performing offensively.”

With just three games left to go, there is not much the Gamecocks can do to salvage this season. 

A bowl game is still technically in reach, but the team would need to win out, including next week on the road against No. 3 Texas A&M. That’s a lot to ask for a team that is (3-6) and coming off four straight losses. 

After A&M, the team ends the season at home against Coastal Carolina and an equally struggling Clemson team. 

Here are three takeaways from the team’s loss against the Ole Miss Rebels.

It was beyond time for a change

Saying South Carolina’s offense has been bad this season would be an understatement. 

The Gamecocks have the worst offense in the SEC in terms of yards gained and points scored. The team is one of three in the conference to not yet reach 1,000 yards rushing and ranks as the third-worst passing unit. 

Not all the offensive struggles lay at Shula’s feet. It takes a complete effort to look this bad, but he certainly wasn’t making things better. 

“We, as a coaching staff, got to continue to do a good job of helping our players be their very best,” Beamer said after the Ole Miss game. 

The Gamecocks were outgained 430-230 against the Rebels. South Carolina gained 180 of its yards in the passing game and just 50 on the ground. 

It was the fourth time this season South Carolina ran for under 100 yards, including a 6-yard performance against Missouri.

“We needed to run the ball better than what we did,” Beamer said. “We popped a couple runs in there and had some good things going. We should have been able to run the ball a bit better than what we did tonight.”

Nine games of struggles was the breaking point for Beamer, and he made his second staff firing of the season by letting go of Shula. The Gamecocks released offensive line coach Lonnie Teasley earlier this season. 

Shula’s firing is not guaranteed to lead to any drastic changes, but it will give the team a new voice in a time when they desperately need one. 

It just may have been too little, too late. 

This year has been the exact opposite of last season

Entering this season, vibes around the South Carolina program were at a peak they haven’t reached since Spurrier. 

Whispers of Playoffs and Heisman trophies echoed through the fanbase and inside the program. Nine games in, those believers are looking back, wondering how it all went so wrong. 

Rewind one year ago, the team was in a completely different boat. The Gamecocks entered the season with moderate expectations, led by an inexperienced freshman. 

The team turned that into a 9-4 season and was in the playoff hunt until the final selection day of the season. LaNorris Sellers emerged as a must-see player and NFL draft talks exploded. 

That team had something that this one doesn’t. That team did not play itself out of games, but kept itself in them. That team could lean on their playmakers to make a play when other things weren’t working. This one can’t. 

Sure, that team lost a couple of close games that kept them out of The Playoff, but they learned from those mistakes. This team continues making the same mistakes weekly. 

What is the difference this year? It could be the change in offensive coordinators, the roster turnover or just straight bad luck. It could even be a combination of the three. 

A lot of teams in this situation would give up and coast to the end of the season. After their loss to Ole Miss, Beamer said he knows his team is committed to getting better and getting past the losses. 

“These guys will respond. I don’t have to dangle anything,” Beamer said. “We’re sick and tired of this feeling. … They’re tired of feeling that way, and we’re going to go right back to work and try and fix the things that we can to get better so we can finish.

Next week is must-win

Beamer said in his postgame press conference, this team is still aiming to make a bowl game. If that’s the case, next week and beyond are a must-win. 

“F-yeah, bowl games matter,” Beamer said. “We’re trying to get to a bowl game, and the only way you can do that is finding a way to win a football game.”

With a (3-6) record, the Gamecocks have to beat Texas A&M, Coastal Carolina and Clemson to reach bowl eligibility. 

It all starts with beating the No. 3 Aggies on their home field next week. Texas A&M has been one of the best teams in the country this season and is thriving in its second season under former Duke head coach Mike Elko. 

The Aggies have one of the top defenses in the conference and could give an already struggling Gamecock offense problems. It will be South Carolina’s first game without Shula. Beamer has not said who will take over play-calling duties. 

If the Gamecocks manage to upset the Aggies, they’d end the year on their own field against two in-state rivals. If they lose, they can still technically go to a bowl as a five-win team, but there would have to be not enough (6-6) teams to fill all the bowls. 

Either way, no matter what happens, the team needs to start winning games.