re: 2013 South Carolina Recruiting Thread (and stuff):

quote:

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Lattimore replacement?

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This has already been explained well above: we were averaging a bit over 200 ypg when Lattimore went down with his injury in the 7th game of the season (MSU). The rest of the way we averaged 185 ypg, to finish around 192 ypg for the season.

Dropping only 15 ypg after losing your Heisman-caliber RB for the season is what I call an excellent way to absorb such a loss...especially when we were left with a true freshman RB who was expected to be red-shirted when the season started, a raw QB who just took over for our dismissed 5th-year senior the week before, and our passing offense was sporadic at best up to that point.

Of course, Lattimore was shouldering the VAST majority of that 200 ypg on his own when he went down (he was the 3rd-leading rushing in the nation at the time), and afterwards it was done more with a committee of Wilds, Shaw and Miles towards the end. Lattimore scored his 10 rushing TDs in his 7+ games, and Shaw and Wilds combined to score all 11 of their rushing TDs in the last 6 games. To say the least we did pretty well to mitigate the loss as much as we could...

Wilds and Davis are similar type RBs to Lattimore in that they are good-sized, physical backs who hit the gaps quick and hard, run behind their pads, and always fall forward when they are tackled. Wilds does not have the same skill of slipping the initial 1st or 2nd tackle upon slipping through the LOS that Lattimore does, but still averaged 5 ypc when he became a starter.

Right now our RB depth is better than at any time under Spurrier, and is pretty young as well...