South Carolina coach Shane Beamer had seen enough from his taunting Illinois counterpart and lost it.
The wild scene occurred after Illinois cornerback Jaheim Clarke was injured tackling South Carolina quarterback LaNorris Sellers in the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl at Camping World Stadium in Orlando, Fla., on Tuesday.
Illinois coach Bret Bielema walked across the field to check on Sellers, then held his arms out wide until Beamer and the Gamecocks sideline saw him.
The taunting quickly enraged Beamer, who ran onto the field in search of Bielema.
Beamer had to be physically restrained by his staff and the referees. Beamer turned back at one point and shouted at Bielema before returning to a fired-up sideline.
“In all my years of coaching, I’ve never seen that happen,” Beamer told reporters after his South Carolina squad’s 21-17 loss. “An opposing coach comes over while his player is hurt and basically say something to the opposing coach.”
The two coaches confirmed after the game that the dispute was over a signal South Carolina’s kick returners gave on a third-quarter kickoff.
A player giving that typical arms-out signal would usually let the ball go over his head and not return it.
But the Gamecocks fielded the kick and tried a lateral play that ended with a tackle at the 25.
Beamer told reporters he cleared the use of that signal with the Big 12 officiating crew before the game and that it was legal, as long as the returners did not wave their arms to signal a fair catch.
“You have to ask him why he didn’t take it up with the officials and why he felt the need to come over here when his player was on the ground and look at me and say something to me and do that motion to me like I was full of you know what to do it,” Beamer said. “That’s what I have an issue with. I’m a competitive guy, when someone does that to me I’m gonna respond because I thought that was bush league.”
Bielema said that while returning the kick was legal, it went against the spirit of using that signal to limit injuries on kickoff returns.
“The ethic of what that is got evaporated there because our kids stopped running,” Bielema said … “He thought I did it to him. I did it [the gesture] to the whole dam sideline … I want them to understand I know what just happened.”
It’s uncertain if the excitement from the incident carried over, but Bielema got the better of Beamer a few plays later by substituting late and forcing South Carolina to use a timeout. Bielema also got the last laugh as Illinois came away with the win to finish 10-3 as South Carolina ended its season with a 9-4 mark.
