BONUS COLUMN: Enjoying the wins, not enduring them

Okay, so it wasn’t pretty.  If you polled America today, I doubt most folks would say “WOW!  That was a top 10 performance from South Carolina.”  Well, sorry to be infantile about this but DUH!!  What did you honestly expect from that setting?

We are on the road, in the rain, at night against a team whose Coach had declared the game his team’s Super Bowl and one of the most important games in their history.    Throw in a couple of early turnovers and sure we ended up in a dogfight.  To me this was pretty easy to see coming and I am glad we gutted out a win and came home 1-0. 

I have already seen on the message boards fans from Carolina and Clemson trying to tear down this team as a result of last night.  First for the Clemson fans who still are with Uncle Rico back in 1983 and just cannot handle that things have changed (for my Clemson friends who have been really cool and said nice things about Shaw please just ignore this next sentence), the main thing I have seen is that we only won the game because of a no-call on the pass interference at the end of the game.  All I can say is that if anyone would know about winning a game that way it would be Clemson. (cough-Gardner-cough)

And to the Gamecock fans who continue to sport the tin hats dissecting every potential flaw and guaranteeing doom and gloom, please go soak your heads.  Honestly.  We get how smart you are, how much better of a fan you are and how much more you are demanding from this program.  Here’s your gold star and a ribbon, now please go see a man about a dog.  To throw you one bone on this topic, I will say that yes this is the WORST 12-2 stretch I have ever lived through as a Gamecock fan.  Compared to the other 12-2 runs (I think there maybe was one other at most), this one is awful.  

Now to the rational fans who really are enjoying this program for what it is:  a very solid football team with a nasty, salty defense and some potential talent on offense.  Are we the #9 team in the nation?  Who knows yet and who cares?  We have two weeks at home now to work out some pings and knocks and then we welcome in Missouri to Columbia to find out.  

In the meantime, today is a time to lift a toast to Connor Shaw for some serious grit and determination.  That boy was clearly in pain and got it done.  Hopefully he is okay moving forward.  #14 is 9-1 as a starter now and very likely will be 11-1 when we face our first set of Tigers. 

Keep it up Coach Spurrier.  The naysayers can have their details and flaws and technical points.  I will just keep enjoying the wins instead of enduring them.