South Carolina Football: A look at every 5-star recruit in program history; Two are in this year's class!
By Kevin Miller
South Carolina Football's All-Time 5-Star Recruits:
Running Back MarShawn Lloyd (Class of 2020)
The Gamecocks picked up a surprise commitment in May of 2019 from 5-star running back MarShawn Lloyd. The highest-rated Gamecock running back since Marcus Lattimore, Lloyd slipped a bit in the rankings before the process ended but remained a 5-star according to Rivals.
The hype around Lloyd was large, but things fizzled a bit when he tore his ACL prior to his true freshman season. When he was fully healthy again in 2022, he showed his enormous potential as the Gamecocks' leading rusher, despite missing more time late in the season with a quad contusion. That year, he had 11 touchdowns and 750 yards of offense despite missing four games and playing hurt in a couple of others.
Lloyd, like Jordan Burch, decided to leave the South Carolina football program after the 2022 season. However, he wasn't off to the NFL like some believed. Instead, he stopped showing up to the facility and transferred out west to the "other USC" without telling anyone.
For Southern Cal in 2023, Lloyd put up an All-Pac 12 season in which he averaged over 7 yards per carry and had over 100 yards of offense.
The limited time on the field as a healthy player and the thief-in-the-night type exit from Columbia left bad tastes in the mouths of South Carolina football fans. Even still, he was a 5-star.