By james art 
COLUMBIA – Shane Beamer got a little emotional.
The South Carolina football coach was asked what it meant to see the performance of starting quarterback Lanoris Sellers in the Gamecocks’ upset of No. 11 Texas A&M 44-20 at Williams-Brice Stadium.
Beamer, after pausing to fight back tears, said he saw Norris Sellers, LaNorris’ father, in the hallway, just looked at him and said, “You have a great son.”
All season long, Beamer has been Sellers’ biggest advocate, saying the redshirt freshman just needs more experience. On Saturday, Sellers came out leading the team with his stability, ability to avoid pressure and stay on his feet. He finished with 244 passing yards, two touchdowns and a career-high 106 rushing yards without a single loss. That’s what destroyed the Aggies (7-2, 5-1 SEC).
The Gamecocks (4-3, 3-3) lost to LSU and Alabama by a combined five points, and the narrative was their failure to finish close games against ranked teams.
Beamer pointed out that in those losses, Sellers was still inexperienced — he had played just two complete games until Week 7.
The skill was there; it was just going to take time for him to come together and he finally did against Texas A&M.
Sellers, who scored the opening touchdown on a 23-yard run, had two defenders sprinting at him at full speed on first and five midway through the first quarter. He stayed, saw the field (a problem since the start of the season) and found tight end Josh Simon for a 15-yard touchdown to give South Carolina a 14-0 lead.
On one drive against Alabama, Sellers slid short of what should have been an easy first down. Against the Aggies, on third-and-8 at 10:53 of the second quarter, Sellers slipped out, outran the first defender, then bulldozed a second defender in the head for a first down.
Most of the success for South Carolina this season has come on defense; most of the doubt was about Sellers’ offense. With both teams having elite defenses, the difference would be which quarterback could do enough to win.
The sellers prevailed.
The moment of maturity came when Sellers lost star freshman Mazeo Bennett Jr. just before halftime. This could have been a momentum-changing point on offense. Bennett had caught Sellers’ first-ever touchdown pass this season against Kentucky and has been his go-to receiver ever since.
The sellers continued.
Texas A&M was no fluke. Since the 27-3 loss to Ole Miss on Oct. 5, he has been improving quickly.
Through three games, Sellers is 52 of 82 for 657 passing yards combined. He was sacked five times against Oklahoma, but none against the Aggies. That’s a credit to the offensive line, but he also got out of pressure plenty of times. He hasn’t had an interception in the last two games after throwing one in each of the previous four. He had seven errors in his first six games, but none against the Sooners or Aggies.
A snap for the redshirt freshman.
He always had the skills. He just needed time, as Beamer says all the time.
Lulu Kessin covers South Carolina track and field for The Greenville News and the USA TODAY Network. Email her at [email protected] and follow her on X formerly known as Twitter @Lulukesin