South Carolina (3-3, 1-3 SEC) travels to Norman for the first time Saturday to take on the Oklahoma Sooners (4-2, 1-2 SEC). Kickoff will be at 12:45 ET and the game will air on SEC Network.
Those are some facts. Here are some thoughts.
The folks in Vegas don't appear to have much faith in the offenses of South Carolina and Oklahoma. The over/under for Saturday's game in Norman is just 41.5 points -- the lowest of any SEC game this week.
That means the sharps who make the betting lines believe both teams won't account for six total touchdowns.
Honestly, that's reasonable. In SEC play only, no team is tallying fewer yards than Oklahoma (250 per game) and only Kentucky is scoring less points than the Sooners.
In last week's 34-3 loss to No. 1 Texas, Oklahoma had just 237 total yards and dropped out of the AP Top 25.
If there are South Carolina fans unhappy about the Gamecocks' offensive production, look at the numbers OU has put up. Your muscles will be free of tension.
South Carolina is ahead of the Sooners in basically every offensive category.
In a game where few points are expected, where the defenses are editing out some time in their highlight reels, it should be comforting to South Carolina fans that for the first time in a month, the Gamecocks have the better offense in a conference game.
This game might come down to which young quarterback can hold up better: South Carolina redshirt freshman LaNorris Sellers or Oklahoma true freshman Michael Hawkins Jr. Neither is being asked to win a shootout. Their task will be pretty simple: Lead two or three touchdown drives and trust your defense.
We are halfway through this South Carolina season -- with arguably the Gamecocks' three-toughest opponents behind them -- and, well, Kennard is ahead of schedule to break Clowney's school record for sacks in a season (13 in 2012).
Kennard, the 6-foot-5 Georgia Tech transfer who gets off the edge like a rodeo bull, has 7.5 sacks through six games -- and that doesn't even include the best of the season, which didn't count because Shane Beamer accepted a penalty during the Ole Miss game.
At his current pace, Kennard will finish the year with 15 sacks and put himself atop a major Gamecock record. And he might even pass Clowney for, arguably, a more impressive title.
In 2012, Clowney made 23.5 tackles for loss -- including maybe the greatest hit ever executed on a football field in the Outback Bowl. Kennard (11.5 TFLs) is off the pace right now, but is within striking distance to put up perhaps the best statistical season by a South Carolina pass rusher.
If he's not licking his chops to get after an Oklahoma offensive line that gives up over three sacks a game (127th in the nation), his coaches certainly are.
For whatever reason, I just have it in my head that South Carolina can't run the ball.
Not to say there aren't more, but I can only think of a handful of explosive runs this season: The long touchdowns by Sellers and Rocket Sanders against LSU, a 27-yard run in that same game by Sanders and 30-yard run by Sellers against Ole Miss. Nothing else come to mind.
It doesn't feel like the Gamecocks run the ball at an elite level, or that they're easily moving the chains with their ground game. But the stats say otherwise.
The Gamecocks' rushing offense ranks 55th in college football (175.3 yards per game) and, only using stats from conference games, South Carolina is the sixth-best rushing team in the SEC.
Perhaps the lack of flashy touchdowns has triggered my brain to think South Carolina can't run the ball. Or, I've overlooked all the decent runs because those decent runs rarely lead to points. Or, maybe, I forget about the first- and second-down runs when the Gamecocks go three-and-out after an incomplete pass on third down.
Or perhaps I've just underrated the ground game.
For the second time since becoming a head coach, Beamer will return to a place where he was formerly an assistant coach.
He, of course, spent time as an assistant for Kirby Smart at Georgia, and his first conference game as a head coach was in Athens (a 40-13 loss in Athens).
This trip, though, seems to mean more.
Beamer was an assistant head coach and tight ends coach at Oklahoma for three seasons, working under Lincoln Riley and learning from Sooners athletic director Joe Castiglione.
"(He) was so good to me during my time there and really poured into me as an assistant coach who had goals of becoming a head coach," Beamer said of Castiglione. "I can't thank him enough."
In that time, OU won three Big 12 titles, produced a Heisman winner (Kyler Murray) and made two College Football Playoff appearances.
It ascended Beamer enough that South Carolina came calling in December 2020, ready to hand over the keys to the program. Now, in his first time coaching again in Norman, the Gamecocks will be at the same Embassy Suites that he and his family stayed in when he first got the OU job.
"I'd be lying if I said there wasn't going to be emotions," Beamer said.
The biggest play of South Carolina's near-upset of No. 7 Alabama last week was Sellers' 36-yard rainbow to a wide-open Mazeo Bennett in the end zone. On fourth-and-9, you won't find a gutsier play call.
Asked about it this week, offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains said he came up with the play on the fly, thinking back to veteran NFL coach Tom Moore once telling him: "In times of crisis, think players not plays."
Loggains acknowledged the play wasn't on his call sheet and "we hadn't practiced it," he said.
Some speculated that Loggains was up in the coach's box or Mike Shula was on the sidelines with a whiteboard drawing this play up from nothing. In reality, per a team source, the play had been repped throughout the week, but never from that formation. It was not so much plucking it out of thin air as it was an in-game adjustment.
Still, that's complicated to execute. Give credit to the Gamecocks wide receivers for knowing their responsibilities and perfectly carrying them out.