Dawn Staley considered retirement after losing all five starters from 2023 squad

South Carolina lost all five of its starters and returned just 33 percent of its offense after the Gamecock’s Final Four berth in 2023. Despite this, South Carolina is undefeated and all signs are pointing toward another deep run in the NCAA Tournament this year.

This wasn’t always the case, though. Head coach Dawn Staley had her hands full with teaching her new group the South Carolina standard. In fact — it was so much of a regroup Staley revealed that she almost hung it up after last year’s run.

“Considering what it looked like in June — [I was considering] early retirement,” Staley revealed on ESPN’s College GameDay ahead of Saturday’s matchup vs. Georgia. “I was considering it, like seriously. I just called meeting, not only just individual players, but our team, and they really weren’t in a good place. We lacked leadership. We lacked a lot of things, we lacked conditioning, we lacked a discipline. But once you start forming your habits, they picked up on them fairly quickly.

“For the returners, they understood. But they were in a new situation themselves because they were the ones that are the example-setters. Now, they used to wade into the [freshmen] do their thing and they didn’t follow their lead. Now, they’re the they’re the leaders. Sometimes that takes you back because you have to change how you approach things because now you’re the one that people are looking at.”

Zia Cooke, Aliyah Boston, Laeticia Amihere and Victaria Saxton — all starters from last year — are all now in the WNBA. That group finished 36-1, with the one loss being to Caitlin Clark and Iowa in the national semifinals.

Picking up the pieces from that squad wasn’t easy, but several Gamecocks have stepped into their places and has since excelled in the spotlight. Players like Kamilla Cardoso and Bree Hall, neither of which did not start a single game for South Carolina in their first two seasons in Columbia.

Chloe Kitts and Raven Johnson were a reserves for Staley’s group last season, but has turned into a regular starter. Sophomore Ashlyn Watkins, who Staley has said could start but Watkins is focused on winning the SEC’s Sixth Player of the Year award.

Staley also reached into the transfer portal this season to secure the services of Te-Hina Paopao, a senior who played three seasons at Oregon, is South Carolina’s second leading scorer at 11.7 points per game behind Cardoso (14.0 ppg).

“I thought it took a little longer than we wanted, but if I knew it was going to turn out like this I probably wouldn’t have been that mad,” Staley said.

Now, South Carolina is 24-0 and is five games away from completing another undefeated regular season. They’ll look to improve on that mark on Sunday against Georgia.