A little after 6 a.m. Saturday, Shane Beamer woke up in the Columbia hotel he used to stay in as an assistant coach on Steve Spurrier’s staff.
The surroundings felt familiar, but the emotions were all new.
Saturday marked a monumental transformation for the 44-year-old Beamer: from a lifelong “head coach’s son” to simply “head coach.”
All those days Beamer spent in his Virginia backyard as a toddler wearing a Fisher-Price headset and calling out plays to his sister and friends; all those gamedays on the Virginia Tech sideline mimicking father Frank Beamer’s every move; every single assistant-coaching stop along the way — it was all for this moment.
Beamer was wide awake at 6 a.m. — 13 hours before kickoff — and by 6:30 he went for a run, phone buzzing in his pocket with hundreds of texts from former players, statewide high school coaches and mentors. At one point, in the team hotel, Beamer ran into his starting quarterback, Zeb Noland, and asked about the Georgia high school game Noland’s father coached the night before.
By 9:30, football meetings started, actual head coaching duties kicked in — and even then Beamer tried to make space to feel the emotions of his first day. His young children, Hunter, Sutton and Olivia, kept texting him throughout the day with questions like, “Are you still working hard?” and “You’re not letting up on gameday are you?”
All of it had a surreal hue to it, until just before 5 p.m., when Beamer and the Gamecocks stepped off their team buses and marched toward Williams-Brice Stadium.
“That Gamecock Walk was unbelievable,” Beamer said afterward. “I’ve been a part of a lot of walks where there were a lot of people, but I don’t think I’ve ever been around one that was as loud as that. That was straight screaming from the time we got off the buses to the time we walked in the locker room.”
The screaming never let up. There was no reason for it to. In front of a crowd of 64,868, the Gamecocks took complete control from the opening snap, blanking Eastern Illinois in a lopsided 46-0 season-opening victory.
Everything Beamer had talked about since he was introduced as head coach in December — the explosive plays, the “Beamer Ball” special team prowess, the raw stadium energy — came to life in front of his eyes. The game opened with Beamer saying “Welcome home” on the stadium video screen, a slogan and a feeling Beamer has pushed since he was hired.
All the while Beamer’s parents, Frank and Cheryl, watched from a box up above. Some of Beamer’s extended family made the trip to Columbia, too, to watch Shane’s head coaching debut. At times, Beamer caught himself crossing his arms on the sidelines, just like his father would always do in all his years coaching Virginia Tech.
“(I had) the same mannerisms as him on the sideline,” Beamer said, grinning. “When we had some of those dumb penalties, I could hear him talking to me, knowing what he was probably saying about the dumb penalties we had and getting that fixed.”
Beamer is 1-0 as a head coach — and, no, the schedule isn’t going to get any easier. The Gamecocks will be tested, the honeymoon period and warm feelings might not last. Eastern Illinois is the kind of team USC is supposed to beat, and beat handily.
But Saturday was celebratory nonetheless, the dawning of a new era for both the Beamer family and South Carolina football. Beamer said he promised himself he’d try to enjoy it as much as he could, to relish every experience. After the final second ticked off the clock, a group of Gamecocks dumped orange Gatorade on Beamer’s back. Beamer’s children embraced him — 8-year-old Hunter wearing a garnet No. 1 jersey — and then the head coach pointed toward the crowd.
Minutes later, Beamer found his father on the field talking special teams with coordinator Pete Lembo. Beamer interrupted them to give Frank a hug. Later Frank would tell Beamer, simply, “Good opening game, good opening win, get ready for next week.” It was the kind of statement a head coach’s son expects from his father.
Of course, Beamer still had some head coaching of his own to do, too.
“I just told (our players) in the locker room, as special as tonight was for me personally, the most rewarding part, the most fun, was just seeing the smiles on their faces and the joy in the locker room right now,” Beamer said.
“I love coaching these guys. I love being the head coach here at South Carolina.”