South Carolina at Boston College: Four things to watch for and an opponent scouting report

After having the last few days off, South Carolina will return to game action on Tuesday to face Boston College. The Gamecocks will look to wrap up their three-game road trip with a win after a 1-1 split in Fort Myers last week.

This matchup will be a part of the SEC/ACC Men’s Basketball Challenge, where each SEC team is paired up to face off against an ACC foe.

Tip-off is set for 7 p.m. on ACC Network from Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.

Here are four things to watch for and an opponent scouting report on the Eagles.

A chance to go on a nice little run

It’s well known by this point that this hasn’t been a great start to the season for South Carolina. The Gamecocks are 4-3 through seven games but did win their most recent matchup against Virginia Tech last Wednesday.

In a way, that game could serve as a springboard to get this team going. Their next three games, including Tuesday against Boston College, are all very favorable, based on KenPom rankings. They’ll face teams Boston College (127th), East Carolina (123rd), and USC Upstate (347th) before taking on 25th-ranked Clemson on Dec. 17.

So while South Carolina isn’t playing amazing by any means, it shouldn’t have much trouble winning these games if it plays how it should. If the Gamecocks want to get back to the NCAA Tournament, winning the games they’re supposed to win is a necessity.

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Will the layoff have any impact?

Keep in mind, the team hasn’t played in a real game since Virginia Tech due to the Thanksgiving holiday. That will have been six days ago when they tip-off on Tuesday night.

But by this point, all of the holiday fun should be out of their system and ready to get back to basketball again. The Gamecocks flew out to Boston on Monday and had a chance to get some work in at the Boston Celtics’ practice facility. It looked like a very cool opportunity for the players and coaches to practice on the NBA’s defending champion’s practice floor.

With South Carolina already back on its usual schedule, things should be fine for the game. But how the team comes out when the game begins is another question needing to be answered.

Another starter needs to get going

In South Carolina’s last win over the Hokies, Collin Murray-Boyles led the way with 16 points and eight rebounds. The Gamecocks even got some great production off the bench from Zachary Davis and Morris Ugusuk, who each scored 12 points.

That’s all good to see. But at some point, the team will need its four other starters to step up and play better. Outside of Murray-Boyles, the rest of the starting five went a combined 5-for-18 shooting from the floor. It’s just one game to look at but it’s been like this for much of the season.

Whether it’s a guard like Jacobi Wright or Jamarii Thomas, or even a forward like Myles Stute or Nick Pringle, it would help this team a lot if one or two of these players had a solid showing on Tuesday.

What can the Gamecocks do with an early lead?

In both games from the Fort Myers Tip-Off, South Carolina led at halftime. A second-half implosion against Xavier led to a rough loss last Monday. But the Gamecocks responded two days later with a 10-point win over Virginia Tech.

If they can jump out to a lead against Boston College, it’ll be interesting to see what they do from there. They’ve been playing better defensively and have shown how valuable making their three-point shots can be. In the win over the Hokies, they knocked down 11 threes.

As long as South Carolina can keep playing that same way, it should be a challenge for the Eagles to gain control.

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Scouting the opponent

Boston College got off to a strong start, winning six of its first seven games this season. The Eagles suffered a blowout loss to VCU in their second game of the year before winning five straight. But they came back down to reality with an ugly Quad 4 loss to Dartmouth last Friday.

While they are off to a 6-2 start, they haven’t really beaten anyone worth noting. Their best win came against Boise State in the Cayman Islands Classic championship last Tuesday. So to go from that big win to losing to the 332nd-best team in KenPom isn’t a good look.

The main issue in that most recent loss was that the Eagles surrendered 17 three-pointers. The Big Green shot an insane 54.8 percent from behind the arc, which ended up being much higher than their 46.8 field goal percentage.

The crazy part is that Boston College hasn’t been too bad defensively at defending the three ball. The Eagles are allowing teams to shoot 30.8 from deep this season. So it could’ve simply been a one-off situation where Dartmouth couldn’t miss.

At the same time, this might play to South Carolina’s benefit. If one team can shoot at a high rate, what’s to say the Gamecocks can’t have a similar outing? They don’t need to make 17 threes but anything over double digits would be great for the chances of winning.

Boston College is led by 6-foot-5 sophomore guard Donald Hand Jr., who is leading the team in scoring with 14.1 points per game on 36.6 percent shooting. He got off to a solid start this season with double-digit points in each of his first six games. But over his last two, he’s only scored 12 points on 5-of-17 shooting from the floor.

In the paint, the Eagles could give the Gamecocks some fits with a front court of Chad Venning and Elijah Strong. Both players are averaging nearly 12 points per game on more than 50 percent shooting. Interestingly, they haven’t been the greatest of rebounders, which gives Murray-Boyles and Pringle a potential advantage.

Boston College’s leading rebounder happens to be Hand with 7.9 boards per game. He’s already had three games with a double-double between points and rebounds.

Game details

Who: South Carolina (4-3) at Boston College (6-2)

When: Tuesday, Dec. 3 at 7 p.m.

Where: Conte Forum (8,606)

How to watch/listen: ACC Network/107.5 The Game

ESPN gives South Carolina a 54.5 percent chance to win

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