Dylan Stewart was already having a rough night when he appeared to have lost his cool against the Crimson Tide. Alabama had just gone 10 plays and 74 yards, draining more than six minutes from the fourth-quarter clock. Daniel Hill finished the drive with a 1-yard touchdown. Stewart let his emotions get the better of him, and now Shane Beamer has apologized for it.

“It’s okay to play with emotion but not be emotional,” Shane Beamer said in the presser after the game. “I saw the play that he got the penalty on. I didn’t see it until just now, and that’s unacceptable.”

“That’s not how we do things around here, and I’m embarrassed to see that. Because that’s not what we’re about, and I didn’t see it during the game.”

Stewart was still on the field when he punched Alabama tight end Josh Ford in the helmet. There was an official nearby. There was a flag. Surprisingly, there was no ejection.

It caught the attention of the ESPN broadcast. Rules analyst Jerry McGinn was blunt when asked about the decision. “Extremely surprised,” McGinn said. He added that Stewart “should be ejected immediately.”

Stewart was instead assessed an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and remained in the game as Alabama eventually finished off a 49-18 victory. Interestingly, this wasn’t Stewart’s first frustrating sequence of the night.

Earlier, cameras caught Beamer chewing out Stewart on the sideline after a defensive possession. The head coach appeared upset with Stewart over the way he left the field, although the exact reason for the exchange was not immediately clear.

Stewart had also been called for roughing the passer on the same Alabama drive that ended with a 42-yard touchdown pass from Keelon Russell to Ryan Coleman-Williams. Then came the punch.

Stewart was not playing in a normal emotional vacuum. South Carolina had spent much of the night getting pushed around by Alabama. The Crimson Tide scored on four possessions straight after going three and out on its first drive and took a 35-10 halftime lead.

Russell finished with 365 passing yards and four touchdowns while adding another score on the ground. Alabama finished with 489 yards and eight plays of at least 20 yards. South Carolina briefly made the score respectable.

The Gamecocks scored 15 straight points and cut the deficit to 35-18. Alabama then answered. The Hill touchdown then made it 42-18.

Ford later told reporters that Stewart had punched him three times. He also said he had complimented Stewart’s play before the confrontation. Despite that, the Bama tight end called Stewart a “great player” after the game and called it a “good battle.”

For Stewart, though, it was a particularly unfortunate ending to a game in which South Carolina needed its best defensive player to provide something against Alabama’s offense.

The junior edge rusher missed the Gamecocks’ first two games while returning from a back injury that had bothered him during the previous season. He came into Saturday with 57 career tackles, 11 sacks, and six forced fumbles.

By all means, Stewart is already one of the top prospects for the 2027 NFL Draft. His importance to the team can’t be understated. And yet, Shane Beamer didn’t hesitate to school him publicly.

“We got a lot of fiery, emotional, competitive guys, and I love that,” Shane Beamer said. “I love the way that he plays. But we’ve got to make sure, not just dealing with all of our players, that we make sure it’s not affecting us in a negative way.”

Dylan Stewart’s punch against Alabama left fans with a pretty simple question: How did he throw a punch and stay in the game? The replay made it look clear, but the rules leave some room for the officials to make the call. 

Officials have some discretion when dealing with unsportsmanlike conduct and fighting. A closed fist on camera does not automatically mean an ejection, even if the play looks obvious from the stands or on TV.

That came into play during the 2025 Egg Bowl.

Ole Miss and Mississippi State got into a fight in the second quarter after Trinidad Chambliss was sacked and fumbled. Players from both sides rushed into the same area, and officials handed out several unsportsmanlike conduct penalties.

Jaray Bledsoe appeared to throw a punch during the confrontation, but he was not penalized for it after officials reviewed the sequence. Then there was Michigan-Ohio State in November 2025.

Michigan linebacker Jaishawn Barham made contact with an official during the rivalry game and received a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. He remained in the game. That decision drew plenty of attention because the contact looked like a headbutt on television.

The Big Ten officials later explained the decision. Referee Kole Knueppel said the contact was not considered forcible enough to require an ejection under the applicable rule. That is an important piece of the puzzle.

The replay may make an incident look obvious, but the officials are still deciding what category the action falls into under the rules. In all, the decision is highly subjective, and there’s no right or wrong if the referee ruled correctly yesterday.