Early struggles put South Carolina behind 8-ball in road loss to Georgia

The hole was already plenty deep. South Carolina did what it could to dig its way out, but early turnovers and long droughts without made shots were too much to overcome.

The Gamecocks (10-11, 0-8 SEC) dropped their eighth straight game on Tuesday, suffering a 71-60 loss to Georgia in Athens. They’re now off to an 0-8 start in SEC play and will go more than a month without a win.

“We’re just staying positive,” Jamarii Thomas said. “Can’t hang our heads too much cause we got another team coming in on Saturday at home that we’re going to try to get. So just move on, try to keep learning, keep fighting.”

How it happened

As a result of racking up six turnovers in six minutes, the Gamecocks quickly fell behind by double digits in the first half. Things started out rough with a pass that went off Jacobi Wright’s hands and into the crowd on the opening possession. A few minutes later, Collin Murray-Boyles airmailed a pass that went a few rows into the stands.

“You’re thinking, ‘I wish I could put myself in right now,'” Paris said of his reaction watching those early turnovers unfold. “I’m at a loss for words to some to some degree with it. … It’s a combination of decisions, of maybe lack of confidence as a ball handler. As a passer, it’s receivers that aren’t presenting themselves as wide open maybe. I think it’s been a culmination of all those things.”

Despite how bleak things looked early on, South Carolina eventually cut down the deficit and got back within two with help from an 8-0 run. But after that, the offense went more than seven minutes without a made basket and finished the first half making one of its last 11 shots.

With an inability to score, this gave the Dawgs a window to go on a run, which they took full advantage of. Immediately after the Gamecocks cut the lead down to two, Georgia went on a 9-0 run before they got another point on the board.

In the final 10 minutes of the first half, Georgia outscored South Carolina 17-5 to go into the break with a 14-point lead. The shooting inconsistencies continued to plague the Gamecocks as they shot 6-for-22 (27.3 percent) from the field and 1-for-7 from behind the arc. They also turned the ball over 10 times.

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Coming out of halftime, South Carolina showed some life and looked a little better in the early minutes to cut the lead down to 10. But it could never do much more beyond that. Because of the early hug the Gamecocks had dug for themselves, they played from behind, mostly by double digits, the rest of the way.

In the final minutes, they started to run more of a press defense, which seemed to affect Georgia at times. They trimmed the lead down to single digits with a little over one minute remaining in the game. But the Dawgs made enough plays against this scheme to remain ahead at arm’s length.

After a quiet first half, Thomas was one of the lone bright spots in the second half. The senior point guard scored 16 of his 19 points after the break, shooting 6-of-12 on the night. Additionally, Collin Murray-Boyles finished with 18 points, two blocks and two steals.

As a group, South Carolina improved on its shooting in the second half, going 51.7 percent from the field But it wasn’t enough to keep up with Georgia, who shot at a 51 percent rate from start to finish.

What really hurt the Gamecocks was not just being unable to consistently score but also making too many costly errors. They finished with 17 turnovers, bringing their season total up to 276.

“It’s like solving a Rubik’s Cube,” Paris said of the struggles. “I mean, I know people do that pretty easily these days, but I don’t think I ever got it done officially. So we’ll just keep at it until we find out what the right combination of things that we do and people that are out there with one another to where we can get the turnovers under a reasonable number.”

Two observations

UGA’s bigs were too much to handle—Whether it was Asa Newell or Dylan James on the floor, the two Georgia big men posed a lot of problems for South Carolina. At times, Nick Pringle and Murray-Boyles were out of position and didn’t look to be much of a match in the paint. There were a lot of rebounds that they should’ve had but didn’t. Newell and James combined for five blocked shots, not allowing many easy looks near the basket.

“I feel like (Georgia) did a good job. A lot of credit to Georgia’s bigs,” Pringle said. “I still feel like we could’ve done a lot more against them. But a lot of respect to them. They played a good game.”

A rough night for Jacobi Wright—Outside of a game in which he scored 20 against Alabama, SEC play hasn’t been kind to Wright. His latest struggles resulted in scoring zero points in 27 minutes of floor time on Tuesday. He ended up with two turnovers.

Key stat

4-for-17—South Carolina’s three-point shooting hasn’t been up to snuff in recent games and that was still the case against Georgia. The Gamecocks were 4-for-17 from behind the arc, which was only good for 23.5 percent.

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Turning point

South Carolina trailed 18-16 with 10:12 to go in the first half. The Gamecocks’ next made basket came with 2:25 left before the break, while Georgia went up by double digits. Combined with their other first-half issues, they hurt themselves badly by going this long without any real scoring.

Up next

South Carolina returns home to take on No. 13 Texas A&M on Saturday night. Tip-off is at 8:30 p.m. on SEC Network.

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