COLOMBIA – There is no vanguard and no decision has been made. South Carolina’s search for a football coach remains as open as it was a week ago, when Will Muschamp was fired and the process began.
But a name is certainly being promoted by a group of former Gamecocks players, and athletics director Ray Tanner heard them.
Former USC assistant Shane Beamer, currently Oklahoma technical assistant to the attack, won the support of several former USC players and other USC officials who collaborated in the search, sources told the Post and Courier.
Although Tanner’s decision is based on much more than the popularity of each candidate, he is reaching out to all sides of the Gamecocks fan base and former players for information.
Many former players lobbied Beamer, 43, during a Zoom call on Saturday afternoon with Tanner, sources said. Beamer checks out a few key boxes: He was an assistant coach at USC from 2007 to 2010 and has a good reputation as a recruiter.
Bonus points: he was born in Charleston when his father, the famous former Virginia Tech coach, Frank Beamer, was a technical assistant at Citadel.
There are disadvantages, mainly because Beamer was never a head coach or coordinator.
Tanner said on Saturday that he had already spoken to four candidates and plans to speak with four or five more, the sources said. Tanner emphasized how to find the right hire for the program and said he would like to find a coach who has already proven himself capable of carrying out a powerful attack.
The Beamer case
Tanner would like to hire a coach in mid-December and Beamer, as an assistant coach in Oklahoma, would be available if the Sooners did not make the Big 12 Championship Game (the final regular season game of OU is December 5, the same as the Last Gamecocks game in Kentucky).
Beamer’s players liked him at every stop. He’s affordable, since he’s earning $ 540,000 this season and even though he was the SEC’s lowest-paid technician next year, his salary is probably more than triple.
The USC athletics department currently owes $ 40.7 million in debt due to the pandemic.
Several sources who spoke to Beamer say that he very much desires the USC job and already has a plan to recruit and hire offensive and defensive coordinators. He has a list of names for each location and has already started assessing their interest if he gets the job.
@GamecockFB LET’S GET @CoachSBeamer IN SC AND BRING THIS CULTURE BACK !!!!!
– KINGMEL (@MelvinIngram) November 20, 2020
The case against Beamer
Tanner wanted an experienced coach when he hired Muschamp, which means he lost Beamer’s current boss Lincoln Riley of Oklahoma. Riley likes Beamer’s contributions to the Sooners and joins Kirby Smart, Phillip Fulmer, Steve Spurrier and Beamer’s father as established coaches that Beamer learned from.
That speaks, but then again, Beamer was never in the head chair. Sources confirmed that Beamer knows that this is his main criticism, but also that he has refused many opportunities to accept technician jobs in smaller schools and is waiting for the right job.
Beamer’s alma mater, Virginia Tech, is 4-5 with coach Justin Fuente on the hot seat, and if the Hokies move, Beamer can be considered.
“Virginia Tech is very interested in Shane Beamer, and he would be at the top of the list,” said a source. “But South Carolina is at the top of Shane Beamer’s list. He would choose South Carolina over Virginia Tech. “
As for the coaching experience, there is nothing that Beamer can do if that is a decisive criterion. He has none as a head coach, except acting as a head side coach during the 2014 Military Bowl, when the older Beamer was recovering from throat surgery.
Final argument
Beamer could channel his father’s rise at Virginia Tech. The Hokies won a postseason game in more than 90 seasons before the oldest Beamer arrived and, after fighting for six years, built a dynasty in Blacksburg.
No matter who the USC hires, it will take time to get back to the level Spurrier built.
Follow David Cloninger on Twitter @DCPandC.