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South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier called out the part of his football team that must improve if the No. 19 Gamecocks want to win their division.
''We've got a problem here at South Carolina football right now. It's called pass defense,'' Spurrier said. ''We're not playing our assignments.''
The problem cropped up in last week's 31-28 loss to Kentucky. The Wildcats scored 21 straight points in the second half, and quarterback Mike Hartline threw for a career-high 349 yards, including the game-winning 24-yard touchdown pass to Randall Cobb with 1:15 to go. The junior was wide open on a fourth-and-7.
The sudden lapses in South Carolina's secondary were even more surprising because of how well the unit played in the upset of then-No. 1 Alabama earlier this month. The Gamecocks (4-2, 2-2 SEC) had seven sacks, almost all of them when Crimson Tide quarterback Greg McElroy spent several seconds in the pocket without finding an open receiver.
Alabama averaged 11.7 yards per completion, while Kentucky average 19.1, stumping defensive coordinator Lorenzo Ward, who is responsible for cornerbacks and the safeties.
''It's the same team we beat Alabama with,'' Ward said. ''We've got to try to beat Vanderbilt with them. It's the guys we've got.''
Ward plans to have his players play tighter coverage this Saturday against the Commodores (2-4, 1-2) and urge his players to be more aggressive.
''I just felt like our guys challenged Alabama more,'' Ward said.
The Gamecocks may not have been able to pick a better opponent to get their pass defense back on track.
Vanderbilt ranks 11th in the SEC and 101st nationally in passing offense, averaging 162.5 yards per game. But those numbers are skewed by 353 yards passing in a 52-6 win over Eastern Michigan. The Commodores haven't thrown for more than 82 yards against a Southeastern Conference opponent this season, and the season-high came in last week's 43-0 loss at Georgia.
''When we have to drop back and start throwing it, we get behind because that's not our forte,'' Vanderbilt coach Robbie Caldwell said.
Spurrier said he has asked Ward to put a little less complexity into Saturday's game plan.
''We appear confused way too often now. We are going to try to simplify some things. We're going to try to put our guys in position where they can't screw up, and hopefully that'll help us as we go down the stretch here,'' Spurrier said.
But what bothers Spurrier the most is he feels like the secondary has the talent to stop any team.
''We make a lot of errors,'' Spurrier said. ''We'll keep trying though and see how badly our guys want to play their assignments. But it's a problem. We have a lot of good players, but for some reason we can't teach them to be mentally tough at times.''
The Gamecocks are on top of the SEC East. But the perch isn't very comfortable since all six division teams either have two or three losses in the league and South Carolina still has three teams from the East - Vanderbilt, Tennessee and Florida - left on the schedule.
''We understand and realize we are in the hunt for the Eastern Division,'' Spurrier said. ''But we can't continue playing the way we've been playing and expect any chance to win it.''
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AP Sports Writer Teresa M. Walker in from Nashville, Tenn. contributed to this report.
