Lamont Paris blinked and Kentucky was up 20: “They were motivated.”

South Carolina is winless in the SEC and comfortably the worst team in the conference according to the NET at No. 89 overall. That’s a bit misleading, though, considering the Gamecocks have been extremely competitive against some of the best teams in the country up to this point — a three-point loss vs. No. 2 Auburn, one-point loss vs. No. 5 Florida, five-point overtime loss vs. No. 14 Mississippi State and a four-point loss vs. No. 13 Texas A&M being the best examples.

Focusing on the record would get Kentucky beat, and Mark Pope knew that.

“South Carolina, tough team. Really talented guys. Lamont (Paris) is an unbelievable coach. They have had some adversity but they are still fighting and they are going to find their way in some wins as we go down the second half of the season,” Pope said after the game. “ … This South Carolina team is really good. They lost to Auburn by two and they were up five against Florida with one minute left. I mean, they have been competitive every single game and it’s a good team with really talented players.

“There are no easy games in this league and this is certainly not one of them.”

Paris was clearly frustrated after this one, wondering how the game got away from the Gamecocks so quickly. It was a one-score game with five minutes to go in the first half, then ballooned to 14 points at halftime. USC cut it to nine with 10:39 to go, then found itself down by 26 with 3:50 on the clock — 23 at the final buzzer.

He blinked and the game was over.

“I thought there was one particular stretch in the second half where it was at nine and went to 20, it seemed like in the blink of an eye,” Paris said after the loss. “In some instances, like we had a stretch in Oklahoma where we had a six-point game, and then a couple of minutes went by, I looked down and it was almost 20. … That’s a tough one.”

On one hand, South Carolina simply didn’t play well enough to win. He didn’t want to discredit Kentucky and its effort to make life difficult for the Gamecocks, but there was a lack of execution Paris wasn’t proud of.

“There was a great crowd and a great environment, but that’s to be expected. We came here two years ago and there was a great crowd and a great environment with a good team and we played well that day and won,” Paris said. “Today we didn’t play well enough. We’re continually trying to figure out what the decisions are and what the physical plays are. But they did some good things in the second half and the defensively in the first half. We let a couple of guys get away from us and gave up some easy ones in the second half, and they capitalized on that.

“We just weren’t able to keep up the pace offensively. And we couldn’t make shots. We didn’t have guys that performed particularly well, not to take anything away at all from what they did.”

How much of it was self-inflicted vs. Kentucky stepping up defensively in a clear area of struggle after getting back to full strength?

“I don’t want to take anything away from them. They were back playing at full staff, I think. But, I don’t want to take anything away from them at all. We had some real struggles,” Paris said. “We got the ball around the basket some, we had some real struggles. Another four, what I would generally call layups. I mean, not like these are drill layups, but for ones that you’ve got to finish with a good player, we didn’t do.”

A mix of both is the best way to describe the 23-point beatdown inside Rupp Arena. The Wildcats did some great stuff, obviously, to hold the Gamecocks to 19 first-half points and just 32.8 percent shooting overall, but there were some missed opportunities, too.

“They were motivated, they had a lot of energy defensively. They were active, they were active,” Paris said. “They were pressuring some of our guys that are maybe not quite as strong with the ball. I’d say that was probably a little bit different. They were after it. And they were pressuring the ball a little bit, but we also just didn’t play particularly well.”