Cats mirror Gamecocks

Commentary: A South Carolina perspective

By Ron Morris / The State (Columbia, S.C.)

South Carolina and Kentucky could change into the other's uniforms before Saturday's game at Williams-Brice Stadium, and most fans would not be able to tell the difference.

A case could be made within each camp for being superior. Yet outside of South Carolina and Kentucky, from a national perspective, the programs are mirror images of each other.

Comparing South Carolina to Kentucky in football is like comparing oranges to tangerines, a Ford Taurus to a Mercury Sable, South Dakota to North Dakota.

Both programs are led by veteran coaches who staked claims to fame elsewhere in their respective careers. Both programs have experienced spotty success over the years. Both have hit rock bottom along the way. South Carolina's all-time record rests precisely at .500. Kentucky is eight games above water level.

Most importantly, South Carolina and Kentucky have fought what seems like a never-ending battle to crack the big three schools of the Southeastern Conference's Eastern Division.

Since 1992, when South Carolina joined the SEC and the league went to a two-division format, Florida, Georgia and Tennessee have won or shared every division title. Try as they might, South Carolina, Kentucky and Vanderbilt never have been able to elbow their way into the top spot.

"That's just the way it's been," South Carolina Coach Steve Spurrier said. "It's a constant struggle."

Kentucky's Rich Brooks concurs.

"I just think they're a team that's trying to do what we're trying to do," Brooks said earlier this week of South Carolina. "They're trying to move up the SEC ladder."

Until either can crash the Big Three in the East party, South Carolina and Kentucky will look to have similar goals each season.

"They're probably a little bit like us in that their No. 1 goal is to have a winning season and go to a bowl and win a bowl game," Spurrier said. "Then certainly they hope someday to have a team that could win the SEC, just like we do."

The fight for each school involves many of the same variables. They battle their history, or lack thereof. They have difficulty recruiting the nation's elite players. Both schools must recruit in their respective states against their chief rival, which means often having to divvy up the top players. Kentucky shoulders the additional burden of operating in the shadow of a high-level basketball program.

Although Kentucky has had greater success � a pair of SEC championships and two seasons of at least 10 wins � all of that happened more than three decades ago. For the most part, Kentucky's glory years occurred during the tenure of Bear Bryant from 1946 to 1953.

South Carolina's history probably has fewer peaks and valleys than Kentucky's, and has been about as average overall as average can be. An Atlantic Coast Conference championship in 1969, Joe Morrison's 10-2 season of 1984 and Lou Holtz's back-to-back Outback Bowl victories are the highlights.

Amazingly enough, in more than 1,000 games played by each program, they possess nearly identical all-time records. South Carolina enters Saturday's game with a 531-531-44 record. Kentucky's is 562-554-44.

"Their history and their tradition is close to ours," Spurrier said. "They haven't done a whole lot in football. They've struggled a bit, probably struggled a little bit more than South Carolina until recently, when Rich Brooks has got them winning seasons, winning bowl games, which is pretty good."

Brooks' club has won three consecutive bowl games, giving Kentucky an all-time bowl record of 8-5. South Carolina did not win a bowl game until 1995 and has won only four of 10 postseason games all time.

Now both coaches find themselves in position to strengthen their legacies at schools that have not enjoyed sustained success for most of their histories. The next step for both coaches and both programs is to capture an SEC Eastern Division championship.

Only then will one program first distinguish itself from the other.