'I'm not dead yet': Former Gamecocks QB Stephen Garcia vows to beat Stage 4 cancer

“It took my wife six or seven months to kick my ass into seeing the doctor, and it was seven months too long. I wish I would have listened to her earlier.”

Garcia’s story has resonated with football fans who remember him as a central figure in South Carolina’s rise under Steve Spurrier.

Stephen Garcia ranks third in passing yards at the University of South Carolina. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

(Kevin C. Cox via Getty Images)

A prized recruit who piled up 83 touchdown passes and 8,000 passing yards at Jefferson High School in Tampa, Florida, Garcia landed offers from the likes of Auburn, Florida, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Louisville and South Carolina. At a December 2006 press conference, Garcia theatrically revealed he had chosen to play for Spurrier by shedding his light blue button-down shirt and tie to reveal a Gamecocks T-shirt underneath.

Garcia was a pillar of the highest-ranked recruiting class in South Carolina football history, but the dual-threat quarterback’s college career got off to a bumpy start. South Carolina suspended him for the entirety of his first spring practice after a pair of arrests in early 2007, the first for public drunkenness outside a club and the second for keying his professor’s car. A year later, he was suspended again and removed from his on-campus residence for discharging the fire extinguisher in the hallway of his dorm.

“They’re like, alright, you’re kicked off campus,” Garcia recalled in a 2022 interview. “I’m like wait a minute, you’re going to pay for me to live off campus? I should have done this as soon as I got here.”

When Garcia finally did get a chance to play, he demonstrated why South Carolina was more lenient with him than the school might have been with a lesser talent. He showcased a strong arm and a fearless running style as a part-time player in 2008 and as the Gamecocks’ starting quarterback the following two years.

Garcia’s signature game came early in a breakout 2010 season that ended with South Carolina reaching the SEC championship game. He completed 17 of 20 passes for 201 yards and three touchdowns to lead the Gamecocks to a memorable upset of top-ranked Alabama.

Though Garcia lost his starting job as a fifth-year senior and was ultimately dismissed from the South Carolina program for failing a midseason substance screening, the charismatic former quarterback remains a cult hero among Gamecocks fans. He has spent his post-college years coaching and training young quarterbacks in the Tampa area.

The support for Garcia has been overwhelming since he went public with his cancer battle earlier this week. Melvin Ingram, Alshon Jeffery and other ex-South Carolina teammates and coaches have reached out or donated money. So have other luminaries like Sterling Sharpe, Fred McGriff and South Carolina superfan Darius Rucker. Garcia has even received messages from former rivals, including Clemson coach Dabo Swinney and former Alabama quarterback A.J. McCarron.

“It’s truly humbling,” Garcia said, wiping away tears in his eyes. “My phone has died like 50 times already because I’m trying to respond to everybody and just make sure they know that I’m extremely thankful for them even caring about what I’m going through.”

For Garcia, the cancer diagnosis has led to an instant dietary shift. He has cut out sugar and alcohol and minimized his carbohydrate intake. Garcia can’t even have a glass of cold water these days because, as he puts it, “it feels like razor blades going down.”

Garcia has tried to keep other aspects of his life as normal as possible. On Thursday, just 24 hours removed from his first round of chemotherapy, he trained the same young quarterbacks he always does just to let them know “ that I’m not going anywhere, I’m not dead, I’m going to keep moving, keep fighting, keep trying to get better.”

Long ago, Garcia read the book “No Easy Day,” a firsthand account of the mission that killed Osama bin Laden from the U.S. Navy SEALs who participated in it. One of Garcia’s takeaways from the book was the saying, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.”

“That’s the motto I’m going with right now,” he said. “I’m just taking one day at a time and trying to stay as positive as possible.”