Scott Hood, GamecockCentral.com
Glancing at the numbers he's compiled so far in 2010, the first inclination is to ask what's wrong with USC defensive end Cliff Matthews.
Then you recall the shoulder injury he sustained in the Tennessee game last season, the off-season surgery, the months of rehab and the fact he's trying to play with a cumbersome shoulder brace that has clearly limited his mobility and affected his ability to shed the double teams he's often encountered this season.
Overcoming all that adversity, Matthews enters one of the biggest games of his distinguished Gamecock career with solid season statistics - 10 tackles (7 solo, 3 assists), 1.5 TFL, 1.5 sacks and 1.0 statistics.
But those numbers are down from last season when he collected a career-high 47 tackles, 10 TFL and seven sacks.
True to his character, Matthews makes no excuses.
"So far, I've played okay," Matthews said. "The shoulder brace, it has limited me a little bit, but it's the same shoulder brace as last year."
His head coach and position coach believe Matthews might be feeling the repercussions of the shoulder injury more than he's willing to admit.
"Cliff's played pretty well, but like he said the other day, 'I should be playing better too. I should be making more plays,'" USC head coach Steve Spurrier said Tuesday during his weekly press conference. "He's wearing that brace on his shoulder. The trainer's going to loosen it up a little bit this week and get a little bit more mobility, allowing him to grab guys and so forth. He's sort of been hampered down with that brace he's worn. Hopefully, that's going to free him up to get his hands going. He's getting pressure on the quarterback most of the time."
Defensive line coach Brad Lawing said the shoulder brace prevents Matthews from extending his arm, which, in his words, has "hindered his performance." Still, Lawing admires the way Matthews has been able to overcome the injury to play well during his senior season.
At the same time, in the wake of the entire defense's poor showing at Auburn, Lawing said Matthews must "step up and play better."
With former USC outside linebacker Eric Norwood in the NFL, Matthews came into the season anticipating opposing defenses would afford him greater attention in an attempt to stop him from successfully rushing the quarterback off the edge.
"I've been getting a lot of double teams, backs have been chipping me," Matthews said, adding most of the miscues plaguing the USC defense are 'correctable.'
USC takes a unit ranked No. 10 in the SEC in total defense into the battle with the Tide.
"It really hasn't been frustrating for me, because I know a lot of the stuff that we're messing up on is very correctable," Matthews said. "We've been working on that a lot."
While his production might be down a little bit, Matthews' effort level and work ethic both in practice and during games are still legendary among his teammates.
"Everybody looks up to Cliff," USC wide receiver Alshon Jeffery said Tuesday. "Every day in practice, he works hard and you never know when he's tired. Justice (Cunningham), my roommate, always tells me, you will never know when Cliff's tired because he always works hard. He's just one of those players that tries to never take a play off."
The fact Matthews was voted a team captain for the second straight year speaks volumes about the respect his teammates have the Cheraw, SC native.
Because of his seemingly never-ending effort on the football field, Matthews has made 115 tackles and sacked the quarterback 11.5 times in 41 career games. His 37 starts are the most on the team. Unless he suffers a catastrophic injury, Matthews will leave USC as the school's all-time leader in career starts.
Assuming USC plays in a bowl game, Matthews has nine or possibly 10 games (if USC makes it to the SEC Championship game) remaining in his college career. That would give him at least 46 career starts, one more than OL Travelle Wharton, the current school record holder with 45 starts.
Only five former Gamecock players have accumulated 40 or more starts, so Matthews should be joining elite company by the end of the month. Defensive tackle Ladi Ajiboye (36 career starts) could be joining him on that exclusive list as well.
Right now, though, Matthews is focused like a laser beam on No. 1 Alabama, which brings their powerful rushing attack to Williams-Brice Stadium Saturday afternoon for a nationally televised 3:30 p.m. game.
"What we've seen on tape, they run the ball pretty much anywhere," Matthews said. "That's their first threat as far as trying to run the ball and then to pass."
Mark Ingram rushed for 246 yards last year against USC en route to capturing the Heisman Trophy.
"I remember that as clear as yesterday," Matthews said. "One of the ways to contain those backs is play physical and hard all night and fit the proper gaps. We've got to take better pursuit angles."
In other words, unlike the Florida defense, adhere to some of the basic principles of solid defensive football.
"I was watching that game in the film room. Florida was taking bad alignments on tackling and they weren't in their right gaps," Matthews said. "I think they beat themselves a little bit."
With so many weapons on both sides of the ball, Alabama is deserving to be the top-ranked team in the country, Matthews said.
"They're ranked number one in the country, so I feel like that means a lot," Matthews said. "I believe that they're the best team in the league. One thing we've got to do to beat them is to play well, play almost a perfect game."
Lost in the hoopla surrounding the USC-Alabama game, from ESPN College GameDay to CBS TV to a No. 1 team playing at Williams-Brice Stadium for the second straight year, is the fact this is an important game for the Gamecocks since they're coming off a loss to Auburn.
They have a tremendous opportunity to shock the college football world by beating a team some have described as unbeatable.
"This game means a lot to us," Matthews said. "We're going to have a lot of confidence going into this game. This is another opportunity to knock off the next team, especially with them being the number one team in the nation. We've just got to come ready to play. We're a little fresher than they are, but we've got to come ready to go to war."
Matthews vowed USC won't be intimidated by Alabama, especially since the game will be played at Williams-Brice, where the Gamecocks have won 11 of their last 12 home games.
"We don't put any team on a pedestal," Matthews said. "We've got to come ready to play and we will be ready to play Saturday."
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