Mississippi State Week...

The Record
3-1 (1-0 SEC East, 1-1 SEC), #16 AP Poll/#21 USAToday Coaches' Poll
Losing is never good. But when you lose and then only drop four spots, you must be doing something right.

The Previous Week
Lost to LSU 28-16 in Baton Rouge
We all learned a tough lesson from SOS after the Auburn game last year…don’t cheer for your team when they lose. So I wasn’t cheering in celebration last Saturday night, but walking back to our car from Death Valley, I couldn’t help but feel pretty good about the whole experience. Considering the 48-7 depantsing Virginia Tech got down there a few weeks ago, our Gamecocks came out looking practically victorious. I’m not sure whether that says more about how hilariously awful the ACC is or how much progress USC has made in becoming competitive against any SEC team anywhere. Losing by only 12 in the brutally oppressive home stadium of the nation’s best team appears downright courageous compared to what most people thought might happen.

But you could turn that score inside and out still not figure out quite what it means, though. I’ll be the first to admit that it FELT like we lost by more than that. But upon closer inspection, one LSU touchdown was on special teams, and another was surrendered on a short field after a turnover. I expected big things out of our defense, but they surpassed even those expectations by really only giving up two honest-to-goodness scoring drives against the Bayou Bengals.

The offense is another story. Unable to find a running game against the LSU defense (I can’t wait to see what they do to Tebow), we turned to the air…and eventually to Chris Smelley. It’s not that Blake was horrible, it’s just that he wasn’t getting things done. When you quarterback for Steve Spurrier, you are expected to get your team into the end zone…period. When you don’t, it’s time to find someone who can. Smelley turned out to be that guy. He wasn’t stellar either, but he got us going in the 4th quarter, making things a lot more respectable.

The Upcoming Week
Saturday versus Mississippi State in Columbia
The Chris Smelley Experience gets underway for real this Saturday. The team is now his. Screw it up, and we’re back to Mitchell. Yep, we’ve got ourselves a Steve Spurrier Quarterback Controversy™! SOS has jerked around QBs to great success, so it should be fun to see what the competition evolves into this Saturday.

But how about that opponent…Mississippi State? 3-1 and playing with a lot more spunk than last year’s team, the Bulldogs are not a team to be overlooked. By beating Auburn, they announced to the rest of the SEC that they are genuinely up for a fight. Honestly they’re the perfect competition for us this weekend. If Smelley were to go nuts against Southwest Dingleberry State, what could we seriously take from it? Mississippi State is a good team that is certainly capable of beating us, so a win on Saturday would be a win well deserved…regardless of whoever is leading the charge.

The Team
A 12-point loss at LSU should not hurt our team’s morale in the slightest. This was, by far, the most daunting game on our schedule. And to perform that admirably, they should believe they can beat anyone.

But for the Gamecocks to make it to Atlanta, we’re going to have to overcome a lot more than our own insecurities. This afternoon, news came from the team that Jasper Brinkley is now done for the season. The linchpin for our highly-ranked defense, Jasper was without a doubt the straight-up nastiest Gamecock to take the field in years. And in a defense whose only one true weakness is run defense, losing a future NFL first round linebacker is even more of a kick to the gut. Who will step up? Ingram? Shackleford? This is a crippling blow that must be overcome before Kentucky’s pinball machine offense comes into town for next week’s monster matchup.

The Gamecock Nation
When you’re in the hunt for conference championships, moral victories just aren’t going to cut it. But even with the defeat in Death Valley and the loss of Brinkley, we still have every reason to be confident that this team can be special. Is that a moral victory? Maybe, but if my belief in this team is wrong, then I don’t want to be right.

Looking ahead, it’s hard not to salivate over a 7-1 record and Top 10 ranking heading into Knoxville. It’s right there on the schedule just waiting to be taken. A Top 15 showdown with Kentucky next Thursday looms as a huge roadblock to that dream, but beat MSU this week and we could be in for something epic.