Missouri had taken a 1-point lead thanks to a late-game field goal. With just over a minute left in the fourth quarter and with the Gamecocks trailing 35-34, quarterback Michael Scarnecchia put on his helmet and hustled back onto the field.
For Scarnecchia, this moment was the product of years of hard work, sacrifice and preparation. Before this game, he had taken less than 20 snaps during live action. But when starting quarterback Jake Bentley was out due to a knee injury that fall day in 2018, Scarnecchia was called up and given the reins to the offense.
“I always prepared like I was going to be the starter,” Scarnecchia said. “It wasn’t too much added pressure.”
Scarnecchia said the biggest adjustment he had to make was getting in sync with the rest of the offense. As a second-string player, he wasn’t used to working with the starters in practice. With just a week to prepare, he was forced to adapt and do what was necessary to “gel” with those players.
“One of the biggest things he showed was his preparation,” former quarterback Jay Urich, who was one of Scarnecchia’s teammates, said. “Whether it be the Missouri week that year, or really every week, he was leading. He was always prepared and always ready to have his number called.”
Three years later, Scarnecchia is on the cusp of earning a law degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law. He clerks at Nexsen Pruet, a prestigious corporate law firm headquartered in Columbia.
He takes pride in the law school, the university and the city of Columbia. His love for the city and the university was the reason he decided to go to law school here.
“There’s something about the culture here,” he said. “In other states, strangers don’t want to learn about you, your family, your work life or your social life. But for some reason, these people in Columbia care about you as a person. I’ve felt really at home with that.”
While football might seem like a distant memory for him now, Scarnecchia wants to become more involved with the team once he graduates. Specifically, he wants to improve networking opportunities for players.
“It’s hard to find a career after graduating for most players,” he said. “A lot of these players have major they don’t really care about. I want to step in and find a way to incorporate more networking opportunities so these guys can find a job.”
He said he is also wary about the contracts some college athletes are signing due to the recent NCAA rule change allowing them to profit from their name, image and likeness. He said he sees the potential for things to go wrong if athletes do not have someone with business and legal knowledge in their corner.
He said he is also concerned that some of these contracts could have provisions for dropping players due to performance.
“I can imagine something like that, adding more pressure to performing on top of playing in front of 80,000 people,” Scarnecchia said.
For many of his teammates during his time with the Gamecocks, the pressure had a major impact.
“If you could see how much anxiety, depression and potentially suicidal thoughts happen in locker rooms, you would be shocked,” Scarnecchia said.
That pressure was there on Oct. 6, 2018, when Scarnecchia took the field as a starter for the first time in his college career.
“The jitters always come in that first throw. Once that first throw happened, I was able to settle in,” he said.
In fact, he was so settled in that when a lightning delay interrupted the game for 45 minutes during the fourth quarter, Scarnecchia took a nap in the locker room.
“I took off my pads, put my helmet behind my head and fell asleep,” he said.
He reemerged from the locker room to a much emptier stadium after the storm and led the Gamecocks on a game-winning drive that resulted in a field goal as time expired. South Carolina won 37-35, and Michael Scarnecchia instantly became a Gamecock legend.
“This game became the Michael Scarnecchia game,” WLTX sports reporter Chandler Mack said. “When you have a backup quarterback who came into a big-time environment and did what he did, that is going to be his calling card.”
His path to that moment was not unburdened by obstacles. After being redshirted in his first year, he took the final snaps of head coach Steve Spurrier’s last game at South Carolina in 2015. Spurrier resigned the following Tuesday.
A year later, Scarnecchia injured his shoulder while working out at home in Florida, causing him to miss the season. He played as a backup for the rest of his career. His quarterback coach in 2017 nearly convinced him to transfer after saying that he was good enough to be a starter at some SEC schools.
“I think he did a good job of processing things internally,” Urich said.
Scarnecchia stayed the course and kept a positive attitude, and, eventually, his number was called.
“Hope that your moment comes, but don’t live for that moment,” Scarnecchia said. “I’ve always had a positive attitude because you never know who you’re affecting. Whether I’m a backup, I’m doing whatever I can to help the team because you don’t know how what you’re doing is impacting others.”