Media badgers Spurrier to bash Gamecocks' players, coaches are doing fine job

Was Spurrier wrong about defense, or did defensive coaches let him down?

Spurrier expresses humility because defense is not where it should be. 

“Are you beginning to feel differently about this team talent-wise,” Josh Kendall, beat writer for The State newspaper, asked Steve Spurrier after South Carolina defeated East Carolina 33-23, Saturday.

On Tuesaday, before the ECU game Kendall asked: “Do you still feel the potential is as high as you (said pre-season?)”

Before the ECU game, Kendall, in an interview with WVOC radio vehemently defended SC's Defensive Coordinator Lorenzo Ward. He said Ward is definitely not the problem, and other head coaches would be lining up to hire Ward if he were let go by the Gamecocks.

The State's anti-Spurrier columnist Ron Morris has also defended Ward. 

Anti-Gamecock columnist says defense will be fine, not D coaches fault

In the pre-season, Spurrier said the Gamecocks would be pretty good in 2014. Spurrier said that because he believed it. If he knew there were major problems with the D, he would have said so. Spurrier does not shy away from the truth.

In the pre-season, Spurrier even complained defensive players had not been selected for all-conference teams. Skai Moore, LB, was left off, Spurrier noted. And he lamented that only Brison Williams,a safety, made third-string on an all-conference team.

Saturday night, after ECU, as Kendall's again prodded Spurrier to retract his pre-season enthusiasm, Spurrier talked about a deficiency with the defense only.

Spurrier said: We did lose a bunch of guys on defense. “We thought these other guys can play, like the defensive players we lost.”

Spurrier specifically mentioned the losses of Chaz Sutton and Victor Hampton. A D-line player and a secondary player. He also alluded to the D-line, where he called out D-line coach Deke Admas after the debacle, 52-28 loss to A&M.

“We still don't have that much of a pass rush, unless we blitz a whole bunch of people,” Spurrier said.

What Spurrier is saying: The defense is not that good. Not as good as I thought pre-season.

Spurrier left the defense in the hands of Ward, and thought it was OK. He was incorrect in assuming Ward had gotten the players and would be able to coach his players on a level that the offense is now on.

Spurrier is having to express humility about a part of the team he is not directly responsible for. The season has started. He'll have to make the best of it. And then we'll see, by the moves Spurrier makes after the season, how Spurrier will solve the issue of a porous defense.