South Carolina Football

Praise Jesus, college football has returned at last. Sure it's Thursday night, and yes it's mainly snoozer match-ups, but it's still college football damnit!

The South Carolina v. Southern Miss game ought to be particularly interesting for Tide fans. We have to make the road trip to Columbia in five weeks, so it'll be interesting to see if South Carolina can finally make some noise in the SEC East this year.

Also, we've got major drama brewing in Columbia. Travis Henry is following the story, and it seems like a lot of key Gamecock players may miss this game, including guys like Marcus Lattimore, Chris Culliver, Ladi Abijoye, Akeem Auguste, and others. Some of it is apparently Hotel-gate, but others not, and of course we all knew Weslye Saunders wouldn't play in this game. Henry says it involves something like a dozen players. Apparently the NCAA was supposed to let them know one way or the other by 5:00, but that passed with no word and now the Carolina coaches aren't happy. For now the players are separated from the rest of the team in the weight room, awaiting a last minute ruling from the NCAA. I suppose Spurrier will keep these guys out of the game if they don't be cleared before kickoff, so they could be playing at a big disadvantage. Either way, they've got less than an hour to get the good news and get ready to go.

In any event, South Carolina and Southern Miss kicks off at 6:30 central time on ESPN. Chime in with all of your thoughts and comments on the this game here, as well as some other games from tonight, such as Pitt v. Utah and Lane Kiffin's USC debut in Hawai'i.