A history of South Carolina OC Kendal Briles' offenses by the numbers, Part 1

The South Carolina Gamecocks start fall camp this week. As head coach Shane Beamer enters his sixth season, he is hoping one of his big offseason hires comes through for him. 

That hire is new Gamecocks offensive coordinator Kendal Briles, who joined South Carolina this offseason after spending the last three seasons at TCU. Prior to coaching the Horned Frogs, he had stops at Baylor, Florida Atlantic, Houston, Florida State and Arkansas. The expectations are high for Briles, who inherits a talented offense including star quarterback LaNorris Sellers, his leading receiver Nyck Harbor and running backs Matt Fuller, Christian Clark and Jabree Coleman. 

Briles' offenses have never scored less than 30 points per game in a given season. Let's take a deeper look at his previous offenses, and where they ranked statistically compared to other units across the country. 

For this, we'll look at where his units ranked nationally in scoring and total offense, as well as passing and rushing offense. We'll also provide a brief snapshot of his respective team's seasons during that given year. 

We will split this into two parts, starting with his 2015 Baylor offense through his 2019 season with Florida State for Part One. Part Two will spotlight his six seasons at Arkansas and TCU. In the second part, we'll also take a look at what these numbers can mean for South Carolina in 2026. 

2015: Baylor offensive coordinator

• Scoring offense: No. 1 overall (48.1 PPG)
• Total offense: No. 1 overall (616.2 YPG)
• Passing offense: No. 24 overall (289.5 YPG)
• Rushing offense: T-No. 2 overall (326.7 YPG)

Baylor started the 2015 season 8-0, suffering its first loss of the season against No. 12 Oklahoma in early November. The Bears were led offensively by quarterback Seth Russell at the start of the season, who threw for 2,104 yards with 29 touchdowns and six interceptions, adding 402 rushing yards with six touchdowns. 

But a neck injury he suffered against Iowa State on Oct. 24 caused him to miss the rest of the season, and backup signal-caller Jarrett Stidham threw for  including  but an injury gave the offense to Jarett Stidham for 1,265 yards with 12 touchdowns and two interceptions.

The Bears finished the season 9-3, with losses to TCU on the road, and a 23-17 loss to Texas. Baylor defeated North Carolina in the Russell Athletic Bowl this season. 

2015 was the start of the Baylor sexual assault scandal, as that September the school hired law firm Pepper Hamilton to investigate its handling of sexual assault claims after former a Bears football player was convicted of sexual assault. The scandal began to overshadow the program during the 2016 offseason after Jasmin Hernandez filed the first of many federal lawsuits against the school.

2016: Baylor offensive coordinator

• Scoring offense: No. 35 overall (34.6 PPG)
• Total offense: No. 6 overall (522.7 YPG)
• Passing offense: No. 24 overall (280.9 YPG)
• Rushing offense: No. 14 overall (241.8 YPG)

Months before the 2016 season began, Kendal's father, Art, was fired as the head coach of Baylor. Pepper Hamilton's investigation found that under Briles, Baylor repeatedly mishandled sexual assault claims for years. 

Kendal stayed on staff under interim head coach Jim Grobe, as starting quarterback Seth Russel threw for 2,126 yards with 20 touchdowns and eight interceptions. Bears running back Terence Williams rushed for over 1,000 yards with 11 touchdowns, and KD Cannon had 1,215 yards receiving with 13 scores. Baylor finished 7-6 with a Cactus Bowl victory over Boise State. Briles joined Lane Kiffin's inaugural staff at Florida Atlantic in Dec. 2016. 

2017: Florida Atlantic offensive coordinator

• Scoring offense: No. 8 overall (40.6 PPG) 
• Total offense: No. 9 overall (498.4 YPG)
• Passing offense: No. 80 overall (213.1 YPG)
• Rushing offense: No. 6 overall (285.3 YPG)

2017 was one of Briles' best offenses of his career. Led by quarterback Jason Driskel, the Owls were a top-10 unit in total, scoring and rushing offense. Future third-round NFL Draft pick Devin Singletary had 1,920 yards rushing, with 32 touchdowns. Driskel threw for 2,247 yards passing with 15 touchdowns and four interceptions. 

The Owls rebounded from a 1-3 start to win their last 10 straight games, including the first-ever Conference-USA conference title in school history and a 50-3 win over Akron in the Boca Raton Bowl. The 11-3 finish also marked the school's first-ever 11-win season.  

2018: Houston Cougars offensive coordinator

• Scoring offense: No. 5 overall (43.9 PPG)
• Total offense: No. 7 overall (512.5 YPG)
• Passing offense: No. 16 overall (295.5 YPG)
• Rushing offense: No. 24 overall (217.1)

The Houston Cougars had a huge season offensively, thanks to how well quarterback D'Eriq King played. He threw for 2,982 yards with 36 touchdowns and six interceptions, adding 674 yards with 14 touchdowns on the ground. 

Houston running back Parick Carr added 868 yards rushing and five touchdowns, averaging 5.7 yards per carry. The Cougars finished 8-5 that season, falling to Army in the Armed Forces Bowl. 

2019: Florida State offensive coordinator

• Scoring offense: No. 73 overall (27.9 PPG)
• Total offense: No. 60 overall (408.3 PPG)
• Passing offense: No. 34 overall (267.6 YPG)
• Rushing offense: No. 93 overall (140.7 YPG)

Statistically speaking, as you can see, this is one of Briles' worst seasons. But this was a down season for FSU in general, as the Noles fired head coach Willie Taggart before the season was even over in November. The 'Noles finished 6-7, with a loss to Arizona State in the Sun Bowl. 

The one bright spot for Taggart was how well his quarterback, James Blackman played. He threw for 2,339 yards with 17 touchdowns and 11 touchdowns, completing 63% of his passes. 

Stay tuned for part two as we look at Briles' time at Arkansas and TCU before arriving in Columbia.

ALSO READ: ESPN Analyst: South Carolina can make the CFP by overcoming 2 big hurdles

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