COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Head Coach Shane Beamer will have to play through injury when he takes the field to coach his team this weekend against Missouri.
During his weekly news conference Tuesday, Beamer told reporters that he broke his foot last Saturday after the team’s 41-39 loss to Florida. He said he wanted to explain to everyone why he was limping before everyone started wondering what was wrong with him.
The Gators scored in final minute to go up on the Gamecocks after USC squandered a 10 point lead.
“Certainly that was a gut-wrenching, emotional loss and I was frustrated and kicked something I shouldn’t have kicked and thought I was okay but the adrenaline of the game wore off,” Beamer said.
Beamer, who was upbeat as he recalled the embarrassing moment, said he then had to explain it to his boss, USC Athletics Director Ray Tanner, who had an interesting response.
“He died laughing when I told him so obviously there’s not a lot of empathy from him,” Beamer said while smiling.
Beamer said it wasn’t a case of him being out of control, but rather feeling like he’d let his team down. “I care about these kids and I was really upset on Saturday night because i didn’t do enough to help them get over the hump and win the football game,” he said.
He said he doesn’t condone what he did and was upset because his kids saw when he did it.
The foot apparenlty won’t require surgery. For now, he has to tough it out. “It hurts like you know what but you know I’ve got to show toughness and fight through it,” he said “Been one of those years.”
“Lesson learned, stupid on my part,” he added.
USC takes on Missouri Saturday at 3:30 p.m. at Fourot Field in Columbia, Missouri.