Remembering Steve Taneyhill: The Rebel QB Who Gave South Carolina Its Swagger
On September 4, 1992, the night before South Carolina would play its first-ever SEC football game, a crowd gathered outside Williams-Brice Stadium. In the middle stood a witch doctor from Blythewood, Archibald Thibeaux, tossing chicken feathers and other ingredients into a smoking cauldron.
His mission? To break the so-called “Chicken Curse” that had long haunted the Gamecocks.
What followed wasn’t an instant turnaround - South Carolina started that season 0-5, and the program was in turmoil after players voted 62-24 to ask head coach Sparky Woods to resign. But just when it looked like the bottom might fall out, a mullet-wearing freshman from Altoona, Pennsylvania, stepped under center and changed everything.
That quarterback was Steve Taneyhill - and in the years that followed, he didn’t just win games. He gave South Carolina football something it had never truly had: an identity.
Taneyhill passed away Monday at the age of 52 after a battle with cancer. The details of his illness were largely kept private, even from some of his former teammates.
“I was in touch with Steve a few times in the fall,” said Boomer Foster, who played with Taneyhill at USC. “Not once did he ever mention that he was sick.”
“It was jarring,” added Kurt Frederick, another former teammate. “Even today, I think most of us are still trying to wrap our heads around it. He kept that stuff to himself.”
That was always part of the Taneyhill paradox. On the field and in front of cameras, he was loud, brash, and impossible to ignore. But behind the scenes, there was a quieter, more focused version - a guy who loved football deeply and worked relentlessly to master it.
The Rebel Who Became a Legend
Taneyhill arrived at South Carolina in 1992 like a rock star crashing a country concert. He rolled onto campus in a black Mustang GT with a license plate that read “USCQB.” He had a blond mullet, earrings, and a swagger that didn’t exactly scream “Southern hospitality.”
“He just defined this rebel quarterback,” said former Gamecock running back Rob DeBoer. “He didn’t try to fit in - and that’s exactly why he fit.”
At a time when the program desperately needed a spark, Taneyhill lit the match. He didn’t just play quarterback; he made it cool to be a Gamecock. And for a school that had long been searching for a football identity, that mattered.
“That was very palpable,” said former kicker Marty Simpson, who shared a locker room with Taneyhill for three years. “It became very different very quickly.”
Taneyhill didn’t transform the program by changing who he was. He leaned into his personality - confident, outspoken, and always ready to celebrate. Whether it was faking home run swings after touchdowns or taunting opposing fans, he brought an energy that made football fun again in Columbia.
“Honestly, I’d been there two-and-a-half years and I hadn’t had fun yet,” Simpson added. “Steve Taneyhill made playing for South Carolina fun.”
A Competitor to the Core
Beyond the antics and the bravado was a player who truly loved the game. Brad Scott, who became South Carolina’s head coach in 1994, had heard the stories about Taneyhill before he arrived. He braced himself for a challenge - but what he found was a quarterback who was all business when it came to football.
“I kind of went into this thing thinking, ‘Whoa boy, how am I going to react to Steve?’” Scott recalled.
“But I never had a discipline issue with him. He loved to play.”
Taneyhill was the son of Art Taneyhill, a legendary women’s basketball coach in Altoona, and he approached football with the same kind of coach’s mindset. While he had a reputation for enjoying Columbia’s nightlife - and even bought a local bar, Group Therapy, later in life - he also spent countless hours at the football facility, grinding through film and preparing for Saturdays.
“He did it the hard way, the coaches’ way,” Scott said. “He was up there watching the 16 millimeter film and preparing for those games.”
And it showed. In his first start, Taneyhill led South Carolina to its first SEC win - a victory over No.
15 Mississippi State. A few years later, he helped snap Clemson’s four-game winning streak in the rivalry, famously signing the Tiger paw at midfield after the win.
He never lost in Death Valley - not at Clemson (2-0) or LSU (1-0).
Then came the 1994 Carquest Bowl, where Taneyhill led South Carolina to its first-ever bowl victory. For fans who remembered the “Chicken Curse,” it felt like the spell had finally been broken.
More Than Just Numbers
By the time he left Columbia, Taneyhill had thrown for over 8,700 yards and a school-record 62 touchdown passes. He completed more than 60% of his throws across three-and-a-half seasons as a starter. But his legacy goes far beyond the stat sheet.
South Carolina only posted one winning season during Taneyhill’s time (1994), but he gave the program something it hadn’t had in decades: belief.
“Steve was not the most-talented quarterback in our quarterback room,” said Frederick. “He didn’t have the strongest arm.
He certainly wasn’t the fastest. ... He just had the thing - whatever that thing is that makes some guys successful.”
DeBoer put it simply: “He had the ‘It’ factor. At the end of the day, it was the intangibles that made Steve Taneyhill who he was.”
Taneyhill didn’t just play quarterback - he embodied what South Carolina football could be. Brash.
Confident. Unapologetically itself.
He gave the program a face, a voice, and a heartbeat during a critical transition into the SEC.
And for a fan base that had long waited for something - someone - to believe in, Steve Taneyhill was exactly the right guy at exactly the right time.
He may be gone, but the spark he lit in Columbia still burns.