I couldn't believe what I was reading.

Larry Williams, the esteemed writer for Clemson's Rivals site, posted a thoughtful commentary yesterday in which he spoke about the "picture of indifference" portrayed by Tiger players in the immediate aftermath of Saturday's 34-13 beatdown administered by South Carolina players.

Twice Williams described the USC game as a "debacle."

He wrote "it doesn't sound like many of these players were utterly devastated to get manhandled by the Gamecocks for a third year in a row." In fact, Williams wrote, one Clemson player, far from being dejected over the 21-point loss, proclaimed the ACC championship game was "20 times bigger" than the South Carolina game.

Not surprisingly, many Clemson fans were angered by the apathy exhibited by some Tigers players during the post-game interviews following the whipping at the Gamecocks' hands.

My reaction? How times have changed.

Less than a decade ago, USC fans were forced to endure a series of performances by the Gamecocks against Clemson that would accurately be described as apathetic. The 2002 and, of course, the 2003 games come to mind initially, and you can probably put the 2004 game in that same category.

Back then, it appeared Clemson's players took the Palmetto State rivalry more personally, appeared more motivated about winning and simply took the game more seriously than their counterparts in garnet and black.

How times have changed.

Years from now, will we look back at the 2009 game (34-17 USC win) as the catalyst for the longest winning streak in history against the Tigers?

Going into last Saturday's meeting, the most cited statistic was that the last time USC had beaten Clemson three years in a row was 1968-70, the first term of Richard Nixon's presidency. Now that USC has tied that mark, what about four win in a row? You have to go back to 1951-54 to see four straight W's for the Gamecocks.

Williams' editorial shows first-hand how the rivalry - and the mindset of the two schools in the way they approach the game - has flipped in the last three years.

Now, it appears USC is the aggressor while Clemson just shrugs its shoulders. Yet, Tiger players and coaches said all the right things in the days leading up to the game, including talking about the sense of urgency they felt to end the losing streak to the Gamecocks.

Whomp, whomp, whomp.

Since 2005, Steve Spurrier's first year as head coach, USC is 4-3 against Clemson. The results haven't always been what Gamecock fans wanted, but at least the players gave full effort. That's the important first step, then you have to execute, and then execute in crunch time if you want to win.

Spurrier's approach to the Clemson rivalry was criticized early in his tenure because he refused to put the Tigers on a pedestal. Spurrier's approach is fairly simple: you prepare week-by-week and focus on the next opponent. By doing that, you strive to improve each week and build up to the climatic final game.

The goal: Play your best game of the year against your arch-rival.

Certainly, that even-keeled approach worked to perfection this year as USC dominated Clemson in every phase. I'm sure many long-time fans, soured by years of getting beaten by the Tigers, watched in amazement.

Really, though, USC's current domination over Clemson is the product ("perfect storm"?) of numerous factors that have mixed together to produce the most talented team in school history.

Most importantly is the winning mindset Spurrier brought to Columbia. Love him or hate him, Spurrier demands nothing short of excellence and his supreme confidence in himself rubs off on his players.

When you're competing at the SEC level, your players must have confidence in everything you do or say as a coach or it will be very difficult to win consistently.

The latest example is Vanderbilt head coach James Franklin. He roared into Nashville proclaiming the Commodores wouldn't back down to anybody. Sure enough, his players took on his personality and Vanderbilt is now going bowling for the second time since the early 1980s.

As I've said before, leaving the ACC was the worst decision USC ever made from an athletics perspective, but joining the SEC was the best decision the school ever made.

Not only has the school reaped tens of millions of dollars from being a member of the NCAA's most exclusive club, joining the conference forced the school to raise its standards when it came to football. It was either continue to accept mediocrity or get better and avoid getting run over by the SEC stampede.

Thankfully, USC chose the latter route. But not before plenty of anguish and suffering, not to mention multiple coaching changes.

The most important thing USC needed to do was improve its football-related facilities both inside and outside Williams-Brice Stadium. Led by AD Eric Hyman, USC's facilities now rank in the upper half of the SEC.

And they will only get better over the next few years with the installation of the new video board, the completion of the long-awaited Farmer's Market project and the construction of the new indoor practice facility.

The quality of your facilities shows the level of commitment to a winning football program, and has certainly been a major factor in USC convincing elite prospects like Marcus Lattimore, Alshon Jeffery, Stephon Gilmore and Jadeveon Clowney to stay home rather than go out-of-state like so many Palmetto State players have done in the past.

Nearly everything has changed about the USC football program in the last seven years. Such as the results of that certain football game in late November.

How times have changed.

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D. McCallum