Will Muschamp Addressing South Carolina's Biggest Needs with Coaching Hires

Will Muschamp's move from his role as Auburn's defensive coordinator in 2015 to the head coach of the South Carolina Gamecocks in 2016 was one of the more shocking developments of the young offseason.

After all, Muschamp is only one year removed from his four-year stint at Florida in which he compiled a 17-15 conference record and left Gators head coach Jim McElwain with very few offensive pieces around which to build.

He inherits a Gamecocks program that sputtered to a 3-9 record in 2015, went just 7-6 in 2014 and regressed into an afterthought in the SEC East.

A big reason for the regression are recruiting classes that have ranked no better than eighth in the SEC over the last three cycles, and it doesn't look strong in 2016 either, as noted by 247Sports' Connor Tapp.

What's Muschamp's first order of business in Columbia? Rebuilding the talent pool by hiring assistants who know the territory and know how to recruit is Job No. 1.

He's done just that.

Muschamp and South Carolina announced via email on Tuesday that former Auburn defensive backs coach Travaris Robinson will join his staff as his defensive coordinator, and former Auburn offensive analyst Bobby Bentley will serve as the Gamecocks running backs coach.

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Robinson's 247Sports profile that includes players he's successfully recruited reads like an All-SEC team. He was instrumental in bringing Vernon Hargreaves III, Jalen Tabor, Duke Dawson, Keanu Neal, Caleb Brantley and Jordan Scarlett to Gainesville during his time on Muschamp's Florida staff from 2011-2014. In just over a month prior to national signing day with Muschamp at Auburn, he reeled in sunshine-state products Tim Irvin and Carlton Davis.

His Auburn secondary struggled in 2015, but Davis emerged as one of the top freshman cornerbacks in the country. Auburn's pass defense came on strong late and gave up just 192.3 yards per game in November once "Buck" Carl Lawson returned from a hip injury to provide a much-needed pass rush.

"I look forward to Travaris leading our defense," said Muschamp in the emailed release. "I’ve worked with him since 2006. He understands our schemes and systems and what we want to accomplish on defense."

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Bentley might not be a household name to fans outside of the Palmetto state since his work at the collegiate level has been off of the field, but inside the borders of South Carolina, he's a legend.

He won four consecutive state championships at Byrnes High School in Duncan, South Carolina from 2002-2005, was named the Nike National Coach of the Year in 2005, according to South Carolina's release, and is as plugged-in to the state's high schools as anybody.

Chris Smith, a 3-star cornerback from Rock Hill, is the only in-state player in the current Gamecocks' class, and 4-star wide receiver Bryan Edwards from Conway decommitted from the program in November.

Muschamp, Robinson and Bentley had better get to work.

As stated in my column after the hire became official, it's an incredibly risky hire with very little chance to pay off based on Muschamp essentially following the same blueprint he failed with at Florida.

But the addition of Robinson and Bentley will certainly address the recruiting part of the equation and should help address one of the major problems facing the South Carolina program.

The jury will be out on this staff's ability to coach until the Gamecocks take the field at Vanderbilt on Sept. 1, 2016 for the first game of the Muschamp era, and it will likely stay out well into the 2016 season.

Until then, though, he's going to do all that he can to build the staff that can address the talent issue in Columbia.

Whether they can coach that talent up or not remains to be seen.

Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Statistics are courtesy of cfbstats.com.

Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and national college football video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a host on Bleacher Report Radio on SiriusXM 83. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.