COLUMBIA, S.C. _ On Saturday night, South Carolina will enter one of the most celebrated, intimidating environments in college football and try to knock off a blue-blood program, recruiting powerhouse and the defending national champion.
Or, put another way, on Saturday night, South Carolina will enter a stadium filled to just a quarter of its full capacity and take on an unranked 1-2 football team giving up nearly 500 yards of offense per game, potentially without its starting quarterback and forced to play a combo of true freshmen instead.
Such is the contradiction that is this year's LSU team. The Tigers lost a staggering number of players to the NFL draft after their historic national title run in 2019 _ but they still rank sixth nationally in 247 Sports' talent composite ratings. The cupboard is far from bare for LSU coach Ed Orgeron.
Still, that hasn't stopped Mississippi State and Missouri from upsetting Louisiana State already this year, and with QB Myles Brennan dealing with a "significant" lower body injury, is South Carolina coach Will Muschamp at all worried about his players getting a little too confident heading into the matchup?
"We don't need to worry about anything. We need to worry about preparing extremely well against a very good LSU team. And I would be shocked if anybody in our locker room feels that way," Muschamp said.
On the flip side, though, the Gamecocks can't let themselves be intimidated by the environment and the legacy of LSU's success.
"You always try to go out there and make a statement, and I always try and go out there and win," redshirt sophomore running back Deshaun Fenwick said. "Coach Muschamp said today, the opportunity to play in Death Valley, just the opportunity to play in Death valley ... is gonna be really exciting, especially at seven o'clock.
"We view our opponents the same. They're definitely national champions, so gotta respect that. And it makes it that much more of a game, that much more exciting, just the fact they just won a national championship. I mean, it'll be nice to beat a national championship team at home in probably one of the nicest, best stadiums in all of college football, so it'll be exciting."
That balance, between respect and confidence, comes back to a mantra Muschamp, a coach known for loving his mantras, has been using for years now: the nameless, faceless opponent. It's a phrase he's used dating back to at least 2011, reminding his players not to get too excited for certain opponents or dismissive of others. And it popped up in one player's mouth this week.
"Well you know, they are the defending national champions. So you know, that's a fact regardless if you look at them that way or not," redshirt junior linebacker Brad Johnson said. "So they do have talent, they have guys that can make plays, but so do we. So we just have to step up this week and play every game like it's a nameless, faceless opponent and just attack on Saturday, regardless of who it is or what team."
Sophomore cornerback John Dixon kept things even simpler.
"We view them as the next team on the schedule, and we're gonna do what we gotta do to try to get another win," he said.
