Gamecocks acknowledge special opportunity while keeping grounded approach
South Carolina men’s basketball senior guard Ta’Lon Cooper is savoring every moment of the Gamecocks historic season, his final at the college level.
For pretty much every step of the 29-game South Carolina season so far, the on-court style and off-court approach have matched — deliberate and measured along with a healthy-sized “prove them all wrong” chip on their collective shoulder.
But as South Carolina gets ready for arguably the biggest game in Colonial Life Arena history, Cooper’s final on his home floor, with just two regular-season games left, is it time for the team to acknowledge the context of where they are and what they could accomplish?
During an exclusive interview on the Garnet Trust Hour on 107.5 The Game last week, Cooper acknowledged that he and the team can’t help but hear the chatter about a possible SEC Championship and NCAA Tournament berth but they’ve done all they can to remain even-keeled.
“I mean it’s all over social media so it’s hard to miss but we really don’t talk about it as much as people think we would,” Cooper said. “We just take it game by game and at the end of the day, we are still trying to win a regular season (title) for the SEC. But just to have our names talked about, I mean nobody believed that this team would be where we are now or at least make it to the tournament so I just feel like that’s pretty cool to see that.”
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Since Cooper made those comments, South Carolina has reeled off wins over Texas A&M and Florida, and the Gamecocks now find themselves one game back from Tennessee in the SEC standings with a chance to cover that gap tonight at CLA in a head-to-head matchup with the Vols with one SEC game remaining after that. The math is simple — win both matchups and Carolina will be the SEC Regular Season Champion (whether another team will also share that title will be determined by other games).
South Carolina head coach Lamont Paris acknowledged earlier this week that it has finally gotten to the point in the season where he and his team have talked a little bit about the opportunities they have in front of them.
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“We’ve talked about the position that we’ve found ourselves in, that we’ve clawed and scrapped and fought to be in, and they deserve to be in this position with two games to go,” Paris said. “At some point, there are too many games ahead of you to talk about what is ahead of you, and I think that we’re to the point where you can do that. It’s exciting for them. They’re excited about it. And I’m looking forward to seeing how they respond to it.”
Cooper, who will participate in Senior Night tonight before the game, says there wasn’t a single moment this season that he realized the team could be special but that belief within the group came very early.
“I just feel like from the beginning when we went to the Bahamas we knew this team could be something special,” he said. “We were just going to shock the world and let our game speak for itself.”
He and his teammates will get another chance tonight at 7 when the Gamecocks host Tennessee on ESPN2.
