South Carolina ready for 'great opportunity' of facing tough Indiana squad in Assembly Hall

Want to exorcise some demons and make last Monday’s season-opening loss to North Florida a distant memory? Well, South Carolina will have a golden opportunity to do just that and more this weekend.

The Gamecocks will travel to Bloomington, Indiana for a rare trip to Assembly Hall. There, they’ll face No. 16 Indiana on Saturday (3 p.m., Peacock).

It’s still very early in the season, but this is where the schedule starts to heat up. South Carolina still has games to play against Xavier and Clemson before heading into SEC play. But this road tilt at Indiana will be telling of how much progress has been made through four games.

“I think it presents a great opportunity for us just to play against a good team early but in a hostile environment,” head coach Lamont Paris said. “The team’s going to grow from it. If you can come out there with a win, it really helps later on in the season, I think, as well as what it does for your confidence early on.”

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This will be the fourth-ever time these two programs have met on the hardwood and only the second-ever trip the Gamecocks will have taken to Indiana. Their first meeting in Assembly Hall was an 88-85 loss on Dec. 22, 1972.

“I think some of the history of Assembly Hall and all that probably will be lost on them. They’re young and it’s been a while since they were the Bobby Knight Indiana Hoosiers that were winning national championships,” Paris said. “But it’s a good play, a good team in a tough environment. We’re going to step right off the bus and the fans are going to hate us to our core for the three hours that we’re in there.”

This very well could be the toughest game the Gamecocks will play before heading into their SEC gauntlet. Not just because it’s a trip to play in a hostile Big Ten environment but also because the Hoosiers, with plenty of talent, are hoping for a big year in Mike Woodson’s fourth year as head coach.

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It’s hard to get a true gauge on how Indiana (2-0) will be this year with its only game so far against lower-level mid-major teams. But it’s clear this is a talented team, especially with their two forwards and dominant center.

6-foot-9 forward Mackenzie Mgbako leads the Hoosiers with 24.5 points and eight rebounds per game. For being as tall as he is, he’s still shooting an insane 66.7 percent from three-point range. Standing at the same height, forward Malik Reneau is averaging 16 points and 6.5 rebounds per game. He poses as much more of an inside threat.

Reneau’s frontcourt mate, Oumar Ballo, might present the biggest problems for South Carolina, though. The 7-foot center was a massive get in the transfer portal from Arizona as a two-time first-team All-Pac 12 selection. In his small sample size, he’s picked up right where he left off with 16 points and 7.5 rebounds. He’s also blocked four shots through two games.

“Definitely a deep team. A lot to prepare for,” Myles Stute said. “Definitely we think one of the main points of their attack is going to be down low on the block. So, we’re looking forward to taking that challenge with their big fella and just going in there and playing hard and having fun.”

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Of all players on Indiana’s roster, Ballo has been the toughest to prepare for in South Carolina’s team practices this week. The Gamecocks replenished their frontcourt for games like this against quality competition. So, this will be a good test to see how those additions, in addition to having Collin Murray-Boyles back, worked out.

“We try to simulate what we can. It’s hard to do it because Collin Murray-Boyles can’t play against himself. If he could, I think that’d probably be one of the best ways that we could replicate their guy,” Paris said. “And then Benjamin Bosmans-Verdonk wasn’t here today. It’s hard. He’s in law school and he’s got class today. But it’s hard to simulate Ballo. Just a massive guy. But Ben’s probably our best chance to do it just in terms of his overall mass.”

If South Carolina were to walk out of Assembly Hall on Saturday with a win, it would surely make up for a probable Quad 4 loss to North Florida. But it would also provide much more confidence that the team is on the right track to get back to the NCAA Tournament for the second straight season.

“Like coach says every day, our ceiling is unbelievably high. It’s just up to us on how high we can get and it’s really going to be on us,” Murray-Boyles said. “It’s not the coaches. The coaches do as much as they can. But it’s up to us how we carry ourselves and how we approach practice and stuff like that.”

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