The South Carolina football team was together on Monday night for a barbecue that was attended by the great NFL program and receiver Alshon Jeffery. Before the team started eating, the players listened to the first year’s strength and conditioning director Luke Day, who sent a message on how to start working, as winter training is about to start.
Let’s start ?? pic.twitter.com/VqDgScCcK3
– Gamecock Football (@GamecockFB) January 19, 2021
Jeffery is accompanied in the image below by the head coach Shane Beamer, Connor Shaw and Shaq Wilson, who is reportedly back on the show after spending the last few years on the Tennessee power team.
SO MUCH TD passes and tackles in this photo !!!
Legends of?@GamecockFB? !!
Great to have Alshon Jeffery here tonight with us #Family pic.twitter.com/T9IcxlEUlV
– Shane Beamer (@CoachSBeamer) January 19, 2021
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Day, who has both college and professional experience, comes to Carolina after spending the 2020 season as the top strength and conditioning coach at Marshall University, his second stint at Thundering Herd. Day worked on the University of Colorado team in 2019.
Day initially joined Herd as the main strength and conditioning coach in January 2016, a position he held for three seasons. He was recommended by Scott Sinclair, Day’s predecessor, who in three years transformed the strength of the herd and the conditioning philosophy during a series of three consecutive seasons of 10 or more victories for coach Doc Holliday’s team. Day and Sinclair – who moved from MU to the role of strength and conditioning director in Georgia – previously worked together at UCF under the command of veteran strength technician Ed Ellis.
“Luke is highly recommended by people I trust,” said coach Shane Beamer. “I spoke with many strength coaches about our position and after spending 90 minutes on the phone with him, I had no doubt that he was by far the best candidate. He has a great vision for developing players, both in strength and conditioning and in mental aspects, which is key. “
Before his arrival in Huntington, Day spent a year as an assistant on the Cincinnati Bengals conditioning and strength team.
Day is a native of Hamilton, Ohio, where he was significantly involved in the ministry of Hamilton’s dream center. Prior to his year with Bengals, he spent two years as a strength and conditioning assistant at UCF, after stints at the USF (2012) and Cincinnati (2011-12). He also served as a summer volunteer in strength and conditioning with the New Orleans Saints in 2010.
Day graduated from Hamilton High School in 2006 and went to Morehead State, where he played on the defensive line for two years. He transferred “back home” to Miami (Ohio) and started working as a weight training intern and majored in physical education.
His first job was to design, develop and implement a strength training program at Mount Healthy High School in Cincinnati, and through that work he made connections with the University of Cincinnati, where he spent 14 months on the strength and conditioning team.