Marty Gordon
NRVsports@mainstreetnewspapers.com
Shane Beamer grew up in Blacksburg and remembers well watching the Virginia Tech football team from the sidelines.
His father, Frank, is sort of a legend in the New River Valley.
Shane graduated from Blacksburg High School and Virginia Tech, where he played and coached at the latter. But this coming weekend, he will be on the opposite sidelines as the head coach of the South Carolina Gamecocks in the college football opener for his school and Virginia Tech.
During the recent Southeastern Conference Media Days, Shane took a moment to reflect on his time in Blacksburg.
“I wanna retire [at South Carolina],” he said. “I wanna make an impact here, on and off the field, for a long time. Like my dad at Virginia Tech.”
Both he and the elder Beamer are also featured on the season premiere of Netflix’s new SEC football show. A total of 10 SEC schools will be featured throughout the series.
Shane may have moved on from playing and coaching at Tech, but in Blacksburg, he will always be “Frank’s son.” On the show, he says he loves Virginia Tech.
His dad, Frank, said Shane has already figured it out and is way ahead of him when it comes to coaching.
“Shane’s really good at what he does. They’re gonna be playing hard. They’re gonna be giving it their best shot,” Frank said.
The younger Beamer told reporters at SEC Media Day, personally it’ll be certainly unique playing a school where he spent so much of his life. While he has played against other schools where he previously coached, including Mississippi State, Georgia Tech, Georgia Tech and Oklahoma, he says this is different.
“But this one is different because there is a statue of my dad outside the stadium. It’s from that standpoint, and I’ve got great memories,” he said.
Beamer has been credited with reviving South Carolina’s football program after years of waning fan support and stagnated on-field production under former head coach Will Muschamp, who had been hired to replace legendary Gamecocks coach Steve Spurrier. He has the second most top-10 wins in program history and was named the SEC Coach of the Year in 2024.
Beamer was born March 31, 1977, in Charleston, South Carolina, to Cheryl and Frank Beamer, who was at the time defensive line coach for the Citadel Bulldogs. In 1987, his father was named head coach of Virginia Tech, and the family moved to Blacksburg, where he attended Blacksburg High School and lettered in both football and baseball, was first-team Group AA all-state receiver, and played in the 1995 Virginia high school all-star football game.
In 1995, Shane chose to walk on as a wide receiver at Virginia Tech—where his father was head coach—over an offer of a partial scholarship from Division I-AA Charleston Southern. Later, he moved to long snapper, the position he played during the Hokies’ 1999 season, in which they played for the national championship. That was his last game as a football player, having graduated in Dec. 1999.
His first coaching stint was as a graduate assistant at Georgia Tech. He returned to Blacksburg to serve as assistant under his famous father. He also served as the acting head coach of the 2014 Military Bowl after his father stepped aside for a medical procedure.
In 2020, Shane was named the new head coach at South Carolina.
Now, all those past memories will come back to him as he sees a Hokie unit he grew to love.
