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Vanderbilt, South Carolina kick off season with SEC opener

According to oddsmakers from online sports book Bovada.lv, the Commodores are a 4.5-point home favorite versus the Gamecocks, while the over/under now sits at 42.5 points. Vanderbilt will lose if McCrary parachutes out of the sky and puts himself in the game, throwing three interceptions in the end zone to seal a Gamecocks victory.

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An SEC battle in the opening week of the college football season will pit the South Carolina Gamecocks against the Vanderbilt Commodores. One game to keep an eye on will be the first SEC game of the year, as Will Muschamp’s South Carolina Gamecocks venture to Nashville to take on Derek Mason’s Vanderbilt Commodores in a primetime kickoff. Does Muschamp have what it takes to turn SC around in year one?

SC scored 13 unanswered points to win a tough game on the road. Overall, they hold a 21-4 record.

The first half was largely listless football – the lone bright spot being Vandy’s defense largely shutting down SC.

These are all good things, and many of them bode well for the future, even the immediate future, but they don’t erase other issues. Branch Bocock in 1925, Warren Giese in 1956, Jim Carlen in 1975 and Steve Spurrier in 2005 won seven games apiece in their first seasons as South Carolina’s coach. Vanderbilt wasn’t favored in many games (two to be exact), and split at the betting window in those two games. SEC Network will bring you Appalachian State at Tennessee at 7:30.

And yes, Thursday night’s South Carolina-Vanderbilt game might be the appetizer to Saturday’s main course. Now, he can notch a major accomplishment on Thursday by winning his first-ever season opener as a head coach. Vanderbilt finds itself in the rare instance of facing an SEC conference foe in its first game of the year, and would love to pull off the upset in order to show the national television audience that it’s to be taken seriously. Now the college football odds for the game have the Commodores favored by better than a field goal to pick up the win. SC will need some balance on offense if they are to establish a running attack, and Mcllwain needs to find his groove early if there’s any chance of that happening. SC hasn’t been held to fewer than 10 points in a game since a 20-7 loss to CT in the PapaJohns.com Bowl in Birmingham on January 2, 2010.

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127 Consecutive games have been played by SC since it was last shut out. The Gamecocks haven’t been blanked since losing to Georgia 18-0 on September 9, 2006. Deebo Samuel scored from eight yards out on his first carry of the night. That’s the fewest yards for any team’s leading returning receiver in the SEC. SC would finish with 308 total yards after only managing a meager 88 yards in the first half. Kyle Shurmur has plenty to prove against USC, and Ralph Webb will only be able to bail him out so much.

Behind Enemy Lines: South Carolina