His Gamecock career is filled with ups and downs, but Luke Doty keeps riding the wave

South Carolina quarterback Luke Doty wears his personality in his wristbands — with each colorful band and bead telling a different aspect of his story.

Doty found the raggedy red bracelet on his left wrist at a surf shop in his native Myrtle Beach. It’s gradually disintegrating from years of riding the waves. Two bracelets on his right hand are more recent additions, gifts from his girlfriend, and each bead is made from volcanic ash from Greece.

His blue bands, one on each wrist, represent a children’s cancer foundation called NEGU. Doty volunteered with NEGU during his time at Nike’s Elite 11 camp out of high school, and the experience still resonates with him. He doesn’t want to forget it.

Then there’s the little white elephant charm on his right wrist. That’s the one everyone always asks him about.

The charm has a chip in it that’s linked to a real-life elephant named “Jenga” in Africa. Doty can scan the chip with an app on his phone and see a map of Jenga’s most recent activity.

“Everybody sees (the elephant bracelet), and they’re like, ‘Oh, that’s cool. Where’d you get that?’ ” Doty said, laughing. “And I’m like, ‘Well, actually, I can show you exactly what this elephant’s doing right now.’ ”

Due to a combination of badly timed injuries, redshirting and increased competition, Doty has made just six starts at quarterback since 2020, and he mind-boggingly still has three years of college eligibility left. His career at USC hasn’t taken the trajectory that fans likely imagined when he came out of Myrtle Beach High as one of the top-ranked dual-threat quarterbacks in the country.

But Doty the man is much more than Doty the quarterback, and his impact on the Gamecocks and his teammates transcends whatever numbers he’s put on the stat sheet.

As his wristbands imply, Doty is worldly, caring and empathetic. He loves to surf, but he isn’t the stereotypical “surfer dude” who lacks work ethic. Doty has studied psychology during his time at South Carolina and is fascinated by the mind and its impact on performance.

Though fans haven’t been able to see it unfold on the field, behind the scenes Doty has evolved into one of the team’s most important leaders.

When coach Shane Beamer and his staff pulled in starter Spencer Rattler from Oklahoma before last season, Doty could’ve decided to transfer and play quarterback somewhere else. Instead, Doty has become one of Rattler’s most ardent supporters and a second set of eyes for him on the field, and he’s the same way with the rest of the quarterback room, embracing a role as a player-coach of sorts and offering them guidance.

“I tend to do it probably more often than I should, instead of focusing on what my job is,” Doty said, laughing. “But that’s the kind of person I am. I enjoy helping out the younger guys and being able to help (Rattler) out when he’s out there, maybe some things that he might not see. I can be there for him to have eyes where maybe he doesn’t.

“I take pride in it, and I enjoy doing that kind of stuff.”

Thanks to his unusual football journey, Doty has plenty of wisdom to share.

Riding the waves

A few weeks ago — after a summer beach trip with his brother and girlfriend — Doty was scrolling through the internet and came across a video about “the surfer’s mentality.”

The video put into words what he already knew about himself. The ocean can humble even the most self-assured people. To surf is to remain steady, even when the waves keep knocking you down. Surfing is an act of resilience.

“I thought that kind of put things in perspective for me in a really good way,” Doty said. “Just knowing that there are always going to be highs and there’s going to be lows. If you just enjoy the ride, everything works out in the end. That was really important to me.

“Obviously, with all the stuff that I’ve been through, the ups and downs and adversity made me who I am today.”

Nothing about Doty’s South Carolina career has been conventional. When he first arrived on campus before the 2020 season, then-coach Will Muschamp had Doty working at wide receiver in an attempt to utilize his athleticism and sub-4.50 speed in the 40-yard dash.

The experiment didn’t last long. After USC fired Muschamp midseason, interim coach Mike Bobo thrust Doty into action, using him late in games to spell struggling quarterback Collin Hill, then giving Doty the final two starts of the season.

When Beamer got to town, Doty’s stock appeared on the rise. His training camp work in 2021 put him on track to be USC’s Week 1 starter. Then, in a bizarre twist, a teammate stepped on Doty’s foot during fall practice, putting him in crutches for weeks as the Gamecocks famously turned to graduate assistant coach Zeb Noland at quarterback. Doty eventually saw the field, making four starts with mixed results, before he re-injured the same foot and had season-ending surgery that October.

Since then, Doty has mostly been on the shelf. He threw just 14 passes in relief of Rattler last season before redshirting the rest of the season, and he’ll remain a backup this year. The time off the field has given Doty ample opportunity to reflect and to understand more about who he is as a person. The more time he’s spent guiding his younger teammates, the more he’s thought about pursuing coaching as a career.

Though Doty will graduate in December — and even though he has three seasons of eligibility remaining — he said he intends to “stick around” a little longer. He’ll start a master’s program at USC next semester and is thinking about studying coach education with an emphasis on mental performance, melding together two of his most fervent passions.

If Doty hadn’t experienced the adversity of his USC career, he might be on a different path entirely.

“I think one of the biggest things is just kind of realizing that football isn’t everything,” Doty said. “There’s life outside of football. I’m more than who I am on the field. I gotta have things that I can escape with.

“Whenever I get off the field, when I’m done playing ball, I’m gonna have so many things to fall back on, so many relationships to fall back on. It’s just good memories.”

Like any surfer, Doty knows the next wave is coming.

But for now, he’s going to ride this one to the end.