He started his first game as a Gamecock. How he’s trying to take a next step
John Dixon admitted that the beginning of his first game as a South Carolina Gamecock football player was a dream come true of sorts.
As the team went up to Charlotte to face North Carolina in 2019, he opened his career as a starter.
The year didn’t finish out as that dream, as his playing time waned. But that didn’t stop him from putting in a different kind of work in the offseason. He spent a year behind the pairing of Jaycee Horn and Israel Mukuamu and learned a little something from him.
“I’ve just been focused on learning the defense,” Dixon said in a video with the school’s sports communications staff. “Trying to be more like Izzy. Just knowing what everybody has to do because it makes the game easy. You can play faster.”
When the COVID-19 pandemic broke up the team, he went back to Tampa, Florida and worked out daily, reconnecting with an old trainer. He made three tackles and an interception last season.
At 6-foot, 185 pounds, he’s been working both at corner and at nickel. He came out of high school more of a pure coverage player.
The Gamecocks are looking to bolster their secondary, which at times played perilously thin last season. Horn, Mukuamu, Cam Smith and Dixon are the veteran players at those corner spots.
Linemen liking the new offense
On Wednesday, Gamecocks tight end Will Register said he was a big fan of what the new South Carolina offense, brought in by coordinator Mike Bobo, allowed the team’s tight ends to do. On Thursday, a second-year starting lineman said the change was good for his position as well.
“It’s more offensive line friendly,” guard Jovaughn Gwyn said. “I feel a difference from last year to this year, just how we run the ball, throw the ball, everything like that.”
Gwyn was thrust into the lineup last season after the opening game. He’s one the strongest players on the team and is suddenly at a thinner position after fellow starter Jordan Rhodes opted out of the 2020 season with COVID concerns.
There had been conversations about moving Gwyn to the center spot, but now he’s only practicing snapping when time allows.
Bobo’s offense has a reputation for downhill running, often out of under-center looks, and allows for some big play-action passing opportunities.
Other practice tidbits:
▪ Gamecocks coach Will Muschamp said in a school news release that the team will have an evening scrimmage on Saturday and then noon the following Saturday to mimic the start of the regular season. USC opens with Tennessee at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 26 and then gets Florida at noon Oct. 3.
▪ In that vein, the team is treating this as a game week in terms of approach.
▪ The team did some extra special teams work on Thursday.
This story was originally published September 3, 2020 at 2:49 PM with the headline "He started his first game as a Gamecock. How he’s trying to take a next step."
