Lamont Paris reveals how South Carolina will build on Alabama game

It has been a difficult first season for South Carolina Gamecocks head coach Lamont Paris. Clearly, in the first year of a rebuild, things are moving slowly. Still, the close loss to Alabama could easily be something to build on in the future.

After the game, Paris explained how the Gamecocks could try to build on the foundation of this game, even if it won’t be easy to do.

“It’s a draining, emotional game, and physical game,” Lamont Paris said.

“We had some guys with heavy minutes. So, we’ll just get back to the lab tomorrow and guys will get treatment and get rested up as much as they can, and get ourselves mentally ready to get onto the next thing.”

That next thing is going to be a trip to take on Tennessee in Knoxville on Saturday. It’s another tough game as the Gamecocks try to get the best possible seeding available ahead of the SEC Tournament.

“So, I hope we can but a lot goes into a game like this, and then a lot gets sucked out of you when you don’t win. I think that’s human nature. So, we’ll get back. We’ll try to make it business as usual at practice and start preparing for the next game and hopefully come out with the same level of intensity, the same attention to detail,” Lamont Paris explained.

“I thought that was a big part of what was helping us in this game was our defensive attention to detail. Offensively, we were aggressive. We got into the double bonus I think in the first half, and so that helped us as well.”

Lamont Paris downplayed the Brandon Miller news

Alabama’s Brandon Miller has found himself in the midst of controversy after police testimony revealed that Darius Miles asked Miller to bring him the gun that was used in his capital murder case. Importantly, he isn’t being charged with a crime. Still, it’s impossible to imagine he isn’t going through more than his fair share of off-field distractions.

However, Lamont Paris downplayed how much this news would affect Brandon Miller during the game itself.

“That’s not really on my radar of things, necessarily. I mean, it’s a basketball game. Guys go out there and for that 45 minutes it was today, you play basketball. You go out there and you play basketball,” Paris said.

“Sometimes stuff can affect guys, but you go out there and you play basketball. I’m me. I’m not him. So, I don’t know what was on his mind, but I’m sure it was basketball related.”