South Carolina Football: Deebo Samuel out for season

In addition to falling to Kentucky in Week 3, South Carolina football lost leading receiver Deebo Samuel for the season to a leg injury.

The phrase “to add insult to injury” could not apply better than it does to the Gamecocks current situation. South Carolina was considered to be a dark horse candidate by some to contend for the SEC East title. Tennessee has struggled, Florida hasn’t found their offense but Georgia looks nearly unbeatable. And then there’s the Gamecocks.

That dream didn’t disappear on Saturday night in Columbia, but it sure got a lot more difficult. Samuel opened up the game with an electrifying 68 yard touchdown reception on the very first play from scrimmage. The point after attempt was missed and that proved to be a premonition of more bad things to come for the Gamecocks.

Samuel would eventually leave the game and not return. A focal point of the garnet and black offense, Samuel entered the game with 128 receiving yards and two touchdowns. He’ll end his junior season with 250 yards, 3 scores and a lot of time in recovery.

How important is Samuel’s loss? Quarterback Jake Bentley had no words to explain what they were going to do without the stud receiver. “He’s going to be part of everything we do,” he said. “Not sure what we’ll do schematically, but it’ll be next guy up in whatever we do.”

The next man up will most likely be Bryan Edwards. The 6-foot-3 South Carolina native caught five balls for 57 yards in the loss. He, along with junior tight end Hayden Hurst will see an uptick in their targets moving forward.

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Samuel’s loss is a huge blow to the Gamecocks and it’s going to take a while to figure out how to replace his role on the team. South Carolina hosts Louisiana Tech next week before continuing conference play against Texas A&M on Sept. 30