Can South Carolina Manage Expectations This Season?

South Carolina enters the season with high expectations coming off a 9 win season for the first time since 2017 and entering as a top 15 team in the country. How the team manages these expectations will be paramount in their success going forward.

“I’d rather be ranked high and have those expectations than not," South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer said. "As a coach when you’re not ranked high, like we were last year, it’s great because you can use that as fuel and motivation. But we want to be a team that’s consistently ranked high in the top 10 and top 15 going into every single season. The best teams in the country year in and year out, they’re in those preseason rankings every year.”

Talk and action are different things when it comes to preseason rankings. It’s all about what you’re doing now that will ultimately pay off in the future. 

“All that matters is what we do from this point forward," Beamer said. "Do I think we’re a good team? Heck yeah. We also have a lot of work to do.”

Every year expectations, positively or negatively, can creep inside a locker room. Understanding how things change from year to year and keeping the main thing the main thing is important to handling high expectations. 

“Every year is different," Beamer said. "We didn’t really listen to it when everybody was telling us how terrible we were, maybe a little bit. But we don’t need to be listening to it now when everybody is telling us how great we are. We’ve still got a lot to prove.”