#south-carolina-gamecocks

#south-carolina-gamecocks

March Madness is the big picture of the college basketball season, but the day-to-day challenges of January are key in putting that picture together. Especially in the talent-loaded SEC, which currently has nine AP-ranked teams battling each other for supremacy, while also trying to stave off upset attempts. One such powerhouse meeting comes Thursday: Texas -- coming off its first loss of the season, at LSU -- travels to South Carolina (ESPN2, 7 p.m. ET).

Being at Mississippi State, we had some knock-down-drag-outs with them,

"I am working my rear end off to get us back to where we're in that mix and playoff talk," Beamer said. "And that's the same thing I told our football team today, that I guess the gist of that article was that would be a parachute or something for me to get out of here and have a soft landing spot. Well, I'm not happy with where we are right now, and I'm determined to get it fixed."