C&F hit the major points. Horrible special teams play, poor pass protection late in the game and horrendous run blocking throughout the game, Munnerlyn losing his head when he most needed it: these are the things that led to another loss to Vandy. The protection problems I expected to some degree, and I actually thought the line played better for most of the game than they did against NC State. However, the other two problems were major surprises. Weren't we supposed to get better special teams play this year? Wasn't our secondary supposed to be one of the best in the SEC? The answer to both questions after the pathetic effort we got in the second half: I guess not.

A couple of things to add:

1. I hope we don't hear any talk about Tommy Beecher starting this coming week. Chris Smelley's second interception was a pretty bad pass, and he overthrew his receivers a couple of other times, but overall I thought he threw the ball much better than Beecher did. Beecher was almost completely unable to throw a vertical downfield pass; Smelley may not be the next Peyton Manning, but the long ball is at least a threat with him in the game. Smelley could put up some numbers if he could get some protection.

2. Kenny McKinley, please get well soon. Some of your teammates can't catch the ball.

Needless to say, I'm not looking forward to playing Georgia this coming week. Unless this team makes some major strides over the next few weeks, it will struggle to win six games and will be embarrassed by the elite teams.

1. Inexcusable. There's no excuse for what we saw tonight. There just isn't. Don't even start this "Vanderbilt is a good team" crap. Don't even start making excuses. Don't even begin to try to explain this away.

We lost. To Vanderbilt. Deal with it.

Where does the season go from here? I have no idea. But next week just went from a possibly close-fought loss to a blowout. I'll be watching, but only to see just how truly bad this team is. Because this is a bad team.

Mental mistakes were the reason that this one got away. But good teams don't make mental mistakes. They certainly don't make mental mistakes that cost them the ball game.

2. How's that special team coach working out for you? Remember, the one we hired that hadn't had a kick blocked in seven years? So much for that streak. The one who was going to keep us from making incredibly stupid mistakes, like not getting out of the way of the fricking ball? So much for that.

Special teams cost us this game. Period. There's no way around it. Two disastrous special team mistakes gave the Commodores the lead, and from that point on it was almost a formality. The sense of impending doom was almost palpable. The game was not going to turn around.

3. Bench Captain Munnerlyn. The special teams might have cost the Gamecocks a win, but they got a big hand from Munnerlyn -- South Carolina's answer to DeAngelo Hall.

Of the 68 yards that led to what would be the game-winning TD for Vanderbilt, 16 came from penalties by Munnerlyn, a pass interference flag and a holding call. Both of them came on third down. Both of them extended the drive for the Commodores. Both of them were stupid penalties that betrayed a lack of focus and composure.

And both of them were unforgivable. Bench him now, before he can destroy the team again.

4. The offensive line. Pitiful. Just pitiful. Aside from some tough runs by Mike Davis, who only averaged 4.4 ypc because he was willing to get a concussion before he went down, the ground game was a disaster, and a good deal of the blame lies with the offensive line.

Chris Smelley was sacked four times, twice in a row on the critical drive of the game. He threw several balls under immense pressure and turned what should have been yet another sack into a 24-yard run.

On top of all that, there were the penalties. Three false starts. This in one of the quietest, least intimidating stadiums in the conference. (Though, to their credit, Vandy fans did a good job tonight.)

5. Jared Cook. If there was a bright spot in this abomination of a game, it was Jared Cook. Asked to step up in the wake of Kenny McKinley's injury, he did just that: 8 catches, 111 yards. As bad as Thursday night was, it would have been a lot worse for the Gamecocks if Cook hadn't been there.

What happens if McKinley's out for an extended period of time? Well, then, go ahead and turn out the lights on the season. If you haven't already extinguished them.

GRADE: F. I really shouldn't have to explain this.

This week's old-school logo.

Well, here we are. We've come a long way since playing Vanderbilt last year, and most of the trip has been pretty sad. However, it's a new year and hope springs eternal. I think we should and will win this game, but it won't be a cake walk, so we need a good performance. Here are my three keys to victory against the Commodores.

Get better QB and o-line play and limit turnovers

As anyone who watched the NC State game knows, these are our main needs right now. Last week, we only scored 13 points before Smelley came in, and 10 of those were a direct result of State turnovers inside their own 30. That won't cut it against Vandy. Smelley is starting this week, but how will he perform under pressure? And will he get the protection he needs? If Chris and the line play well, I think that we can score 30+ against Vandy, and that should be more than enough to win. But those are big ifs.

Stop Chris Nickson and company

Our defense looked good last week, but they did it against a team with a porous offensive line and a terrible QB (at least Daniel Evans was terrible after Russell Wilson left the game). Vanderbilt has a young line, but they have a good, if inconsistent, QB in Chris Nickson. Like I've said all week, Vanderbilt will test our linebacker speed by trying to get Nickson into space, so expect Ellis Johnson to (1) try to blitz Nickson and take him down before he gets into space and (2) have our secondary ready to close in on him if he does. I think we can do these things, but I don't think we'll get another shutout here.

Keep the ball away from DJ Moore

DJ Moore talked trash about our wideouts after the Commodores beat us last year, and Kenny McKinley probably wants revenge. While I have no doubt that Kenny can take DJ, I think a better idea would be for us to keep the ball as far from Moore as possible. Moore is by far Vanderbilt's best defensive player, so my thinking is that we should attack their weaknesses: throw the ball to Dion LeCorn, Moe Brown, or Jason Barnes on the other side of the field, pitch it to our TEs or Mike Davis over the middle, etc. No sense in letting DJ break off big plays like he did last year.

Well, that's a wrap on this preview. My final score prediction? 33-17, Gamecocks. I think we'll play better offensively and while I don't think we'll be able to shut down Vandy like we did NC State last week, I think we'll keep them from breaking 20. I hope I'm right.

Fun fact for this week: A win here will bring us to .500 all-time, an exciting but sad fact.

Folks, feel free to hold forth in the comments.

Wisely rejecting "Dr. Lou's" suggestion that the Gamecocks go with a two-QB system, Spurrier has named Smelley the starter for Vanderbilt.

"He played well and he deserves to start, probably if Tommy wasn't injured," Spurrier said. "But Tommy is injured, so we don't have to worry about this, that or the other. So it appears Chris is going to be our starter right now unless something happens between now and Thursday night."

Spurrier said redshirt freshman Stephen Garcia would be the No. 2 quarterback if Beecher is not 100 percent by game time.

C&F suspects that the "Tommy is injured" line is a way to save a bit of face for Beecher. Maybe, maybe not. In any case, it looks like HBC might have acted a bit hastily in tapping Beecher for the starting job over the summer -- and is ready to correct that mistake.

That said, this won't solve all the offensive problems from Thursday night. There's still a lot to be done. If the offensive line can't block and the running game doesn't warm up until the second half, the only improvement between Smelley and Beecher might be that South Carolina won't give the ball to Vanderbilt as much.

Emphasis on might.