At some point, South Carolina had to pull the band-aid off and let its star running back run free. In the team’s second and final practice game on Saturday Rocket grinder was finally unleashed.
Sanders, who has coached all fall camp, was unable to play in the team’s first practice game last Saturday, but this time was going to be different as head coach Shane Beamer wanted to make sure he got him in some game-like drills before the season opener.
“In the preseason game last week, we played a couple of seven-on-seven situations before the practice game and he was involved in those. We just didn’t include him in the actual game,” Beamer said. “Today we did that. We wanted him to get tackled. That happened this week in practice, we tackled him in practice and he got tackled a couple of times and then it happened today.”
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Throughout training camp, Beamer has made it clear that Sanders is “100 percent” after recovering from offseason shoulder surgery. Although this was his first practice game, Beamer was impressed with his performance, to say the least.
“I thought he looked great,” Beamer said. “He’s a pro. He chased the ball hard. People don’t talk enough about his pass defense – he’s really good at it – and that’s obviously so important for the running back position. He runs good routes in the pass game, he can catch.”
When healthy, Sanders has proven to be one of the best running backs in the SEC. In 2022, he ran for more than 1,400 yards and 10 touchdowns at Arkansas. Last year was different, as Sanders struggled with injuries. He managed just 209 yards and two touchdowns on 62 carries – 157 fewer than the season before.
But even though the new season is approaching, Sanders has continued to make a healthy and good impression in team training so far.
“He’s just a really good running back,” Beamer said. “We got him some play today and I thought he showed he’s Rocket Sanders.”
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Once the season starts, there will certainly be some sort of pitch count for Sanders. Keep in mind that he last played in a regular season game on November 18, 2023. So he will most likely need to be rebuilt to be the go-to running back.
The good news, however, is that South Carolina is slowly getting Sanders to work in. The Gamecocks have six other scholarship running backs on the roster, all of whom have performed well in training camp. They haven’t always had many options at that position. The fact that they do now is music to Beamer’s ears.
“I remember going into the Kentucky game last year, I think we had two scholarship running backs in that game,” he said. “Hopefully we don’t end up in that situation this year, but we have more depth at the running back position.”
