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Shane Beamer shares vision for next USC offensive coordinator, offers hiring timeline

South Carolina’s hunt for a new offensive coordinator is off and running.

Head coach Shane Beamer shared his first thoughts on Marcus Satterfield’s departure for a job at Nebraska and what he’s looking for in his next play-caller during a radio interview with 107.5 The Game on Tuesday afternoon.

“First of all, we want to wish Marcus well getting reconnected with Coach Rhule out at Nebraska,” Beamer said. “That’s somebody that (he’s) worked with in multiple places — and not just Matt, but other coaches on that staff that Coach Rhule is going to hire — that Marcus and his family have grown up around. It’s a cool opportunity for him and appreciate his work here in our program in the last couple of years.”

While Satterfield’s hiring hasn’t been officially announced by Nebraska, word trickled out on Monday that Beamer is in the market for a new offensive coordinator. The second-year head coach joked on Tuesday that as soon as he’d filtered through congratulatory texts following the Clemson game, they’d been replaced by coaches inquiring about the position.

What South Carolina will look for in its next offensive coordinator, though, remains to be seen. Beamer noted he’s open to any kind of system, however, at least right now, his hope is to hire someone who has been a coordinator and has called plays previously — whether that be at the Power Five or Group of Five level.

“You can find examples in College Football of Power Five coordinators that are crushing it now as a coordinator that started out at the Group of Five level or FCS level,” Beamer said. “They’re proven coaches. They’ve shown it. I’m not going to back myself into a corner and say, ‘It’s got to come from from this level.’

“Obviously this league that we coach in is a bear and that’s a challenge. The more experience you have with that, familiarity to that, certainly that’s a bonus. But I’m not going to limit the pool by eliminating people because they haven’t coached in the SEC or at the Power Five level.”

The prevailing thought in college football circles is that Beamer is in a better position to land a bigger-name offensive coordinator than he was two years ago upon his initial hiring at South Carolina.

The Gamecocks are coming off an 8-4 regular season and are 15-10 in Beamer’s two years at the helm. Should South Carolina win its bowl game, Beamer would also become the first person in school history to win a postseason game each of his first two seasons as head football coach.

“Ideally we hire somebody that has been a coordinator before and has called plays before,” Beamer said. “That’s my my mindset as I sit here today, but certainly every great offensive coach had to get his start somewhere calling plays. There’s a lot of fantastic coaches. We have really good coaches on the staff that you can put in that realm that maybe you haven’t called a play before offensively but are a really good offensive mind. I think it’s important, but there’s certainly no substitute for that experience.”

South Carolina’s offense was up and down during Satterfield’s tenure, but exploded over his final two games calling plays in upset wins over No. 5 Tennessee and No. 8 Clemson.

The Gamecocks racked up over 1,000 yards and scored 94 points over the last two weeks. The 63 points South Carolina scored against Tennessee also marked the most an unranked squad has scored against a team ranked in the top five of the Associated Press Top 25.

A big part of the uptick was quarterback Spencer Rattler, who completed 54 of 75 (72%) for 792 yards, eight touchdowns and two interceptions in South Carolina’s last two wins.

Rattler has two years of eligibility remaining, but is considering leaving South Carolina for the NFL Draft. Beamer said he spoke with Rattler about future plans on Monday.

“I’ll keep that between us, but he’s obviously got a decision to make,” Beamer said. “He’s really enjoying his time here at Carolina and he’s really proud of what he’s accomplished — not just the last two weeks, but this season. ...There’s time to make that decision.”

South Carolina (8-4) will learn its bowl game on Sunday following the College Football Playoff selection show.