After flameout in SEC tourney, stressful few days await South Carolina

South Carolina will be watching the NCAA Tournament from home for the fourth time in five years.

Needing a deep run in the SEC Tournament, the Gamecocks (18-13, 9-9 SEC) were ousted by Mississippi State with a 22-point drubbing Thursday night.

The Gamecocks haven’t made the NCAA Tournament since reaching the Final Four in 2017.

It’s a frustrating end to a regular season and conference tournament slate that had some good things. But ultimately it wasn’t enough to catapult the team into the field.

“We had opportunities obviously tonight, at Alabama and at Auburn and we went oh-for-three in those games,” Frank Martin said. “But that doesn’t take away from the fact that we’re winning basketball team. I’m disappointed.”

South Carolina looked dead in the water, starting 4-7 in the SEC, but finished 5-3 down the stretch and tied for fifth.

The total body of work was good but ultimately not good enough to get into the Big Dance. Now the Gamecocks are having to sweat to make sure Thursday’s 22-point loss isn’t the final game this year.

“This year we had nine first-year guys and we figured out a way to win the games that we did and put ourselves in a place where we’re playing meaningful games at this time of year; games with a purpose,” Martin said. “Unfortunately, I think we came up a little short.”

Coming into this week in Tampa the Gamecocks likely needed to win the entire tournament to get into the Big Dance, which obviously won’t happen now.

The same issues plaguing this group all year—offensive inconsistency, lack of a presence in the paint—showed up again. South Carolina scored 17 second-half points and made four field goals after halftime.

They’ve now lost 13 games this season, 11 by double digits. In 10 league games, the average margin of defeat was 15.9 points while the efficiency margin in those losses was minus-22.1.

There was some good, including a four-game win streak with wins over LSU and Mississippi State in there. But the offense wasn’t good enough most of the year to put the Gamecocks even on the bubble late.

South Carolina did finish in a five-way tie for fifth in the league, ranked second in KenPom. It does have a decent case to make the NIT, and Martin mentioned he would accept an invite if extended.

“These kids, they gave me life when I was dead. And I don’t want to stop I want to keep coaching them. This is the one thing that I will say. I’m not will get into all the you know, this and that and all that other stuff,” Martin said.

“I have a tough time believing that the sixth-place team at the SEC, who’s got the same exact record as us and Mississippi State can be a five or six seed in the NCAA Tournament but the seven, eight and nine teams don’t play postseason? I struggle with that one.”

But now comes the hand-wringing part. South Carolina has to sweat out the next 72 hours until the NIT bracket comes out. Nobody in the program wants to be in this spot, having to wait and see if they get into the NIT.

Regardless, it’s another year of not making the tournament despite having plenty of chances to play onto the bubble down the stretch.

“If decisions are made based on the NET, then we probably don’t because that means that it’s style and point differential,” Martin said. “At the end of the day you either play a good team or you don’t. If you play a good team you either win or lose. I’m really proud of these kids and what they’ve done…we’re right there. Unfortunately, this didn’t go the right way tonight.”