Fast starts weren’t a strength of Shane Beamer’s teams through his first three years at South Carolina. It was more so starting slow but finishing strong.

It made sense in year one when the Gamecocks dropped consecutive games to Georgia and Kentucky after a 2-0 start. By Week 3 in 2022, Beamer had to answer if he sensed any quit in his team after losing to both Arkansas and Georgia. Then after ending that ’22 season on a high note, South Carolina went 2-3 by the end of September in 2023 with losses to North Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee.

The common theme in all three seasons? All seven September losses came against Power Five (now Pour Four) opponents. South Carolina did well versus Group of Five foes, but once SEC play ramped up, the competition became increasingly tougher. Then came the string of losses.

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But things have been different in 2024. For the first time in his tenure, Beamer isn’t already behind the 8-ball a month into the season. South Carolina is going into October with a 3-1 start for the first time in 11 years.

And it’s not a coincidence the team is off to a better start this year. Beamer knew things had to improve, and it started by making changes.

“It’s something that we looked at,” Beamer said, “really going back to our summer conditioning. Looking at tweaking some things that we did in there in the weight room — certainly our schedule.”

When it came time to start fall camp in August, Beamer’s approach was going to be different. Rather than go through the usual preseason schedule, he decided to have the team dive straight into the game week schedule.

“We’ve treated every week just like our in-season schedule, where during preseason camp back in August, every Monday was an off-day just like it is now,” Beamer said.

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Beamer said he would also move practice times around to better match the specific game times on Saturdays. That’s no longer the case anymore.

“I would move the days around where okay; we’ve got a 3:30 game, we’re going to practice at 3:30 all this week,” he said. “We play a night game; we’re going to practice a couple times at night this week. We’re going to practice a couple times at noon. … Every practice was in the morning just like it is now.”

“And then every Saturday was a scrimmage and all we did was just change the scrimmage times based on when we were playing Old Dominion, LSU and Kentucky.”

It may seem like minor tweaks, which they are, but Beamer has seen the difference in the results. He thinks “it allowed us to get into more of a routine.”

It’s also come down to the play on the field. There’s a fair argument to be made South Carolina wasn’t far off from a 4-0 start if not for some mistakes in a 36-33 loss to LSU. But the point is, the team is playing better, and that’s what really matters most to Beamer, no matter how it may look.

“I think the biggest thing is one: we’ve played well, two: we’ve got a veteran team that’s done a nice job, and then three: I just think being on an in-season schedule maybe a little bit quicker I feel like helped us and hopefully will continue that success,” he said.

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