Lamont Paris explains how South Carolina can carry confidence from Ole Miss win

No. 20 South Carolina earned a 72-59 bounce-back win against Ole Miss on the road on Saturday, improving to 10-4 in conference matchups and keeping their hopes of an SEC regular season championship alive.

Gamecocks head coach Lamont Paris explained the importance of winning a road game in this manner, especially coming off a losing effort against LSU that saw South Carolina give up a 16-point lead in the second half.

“Confidence has always been very important in the minds of anyone in general, but certainly of any college-aged person that’s competing in a sport of any kind,” Paris explained postgame. “You get the yips, and you’re not going to make four-foot putts all of a sudden, even though you’ve made four-foot putts since you’ve been nine years old confidence. I think confidence is such an important thing. … So, you lose in that fashion in the game [vs. Auburn], then you lose [vs. LSU] in another fashion which is, to your psyche and confidence, even more damning.”

Paris revealed that he’s just now being able to get over the fashion the Gamecocks lost to the Tigers last weekend despite having a week off between games. He wanted to put the game on “cruise control” — but the game got away from the Gamecocks.

That type of loss can stick with a player, according to the South Carolina headman.

“You can say it all you want and pretend that there’s no shaking your confidence,” Paris continued. “But there’s a crack in your confidence if you’re a 19, 20, 21-year-old college athlete. I thought it was really important to be able to come in here against a good team. You don’t trip and fall and accidentally end up with the winds that [Ole Miss] has had. I thought it was really important to them for their confidence to be able to come in here under the circumstances.

“We’re getting towards the very end of how everybody’s talking about NCAA Tournament and who needs to do this to bolster their resume and all these things. To come in here and play well and win like that, I thought I thought it was tremendously important for the confidence of these guys.”

At this point in the season, especially for the Gamecocks, every game is a must-win. They’re currently one game back from Tennessee‘s top spot in the current SEC standings, but are fourth in the rankings. One win or loss could change the outlook of South Carolina’s ultimate conference seedings, not to mention still being in contention for a regular season title as well.

What that means is they need to take care of who is in front of them. Coming up, that’s a road trip to College Station to battle Texas A&M on Wednesday. Tip is scheduled for 8:30 p.m. ET live on the SEC Network.