South Carolina women's basketball: Five Things to Watch - Florida

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1. The Grind
Thursday night marks the beginning of the two-month grind known as the SEC. It’s not just the two games a week that make it daunting, it’s the level of competition. Every team except Kentucky ranks in the top 80 of the NET, so it’s not an exaggeration to say there are no easy games.

“We just take it one game at a time. If you think about it from a 16-game schedule it can get really overwhelming because our league is tough,” Dawn Staley said. “I think we are playing better as a conference as we got closer to the conference season. We all have clamped down and gotten a little better.”

Junior forward Sania Feagin is entering her third SEC season, and she tried to describe what conference play is like.

“It’s going to be an aggressive, hard season,” she said. “Just be ready to play.”

On the opposite side, it will be the first go-around for freshman guard Tessa Johnson. She’s been warned that the SEC is a different kind of challenge.

“They talk about how every game matters and we can’t take any game lightly,” Johnson said.

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2. In her words
Staley was asked a few times during her media availability on Wednesday what she learned about the Gamecocks from the non-conference part of the season. Her answers were interesting, so I’m including what Staley said, without comment.

“The way we’ve been able to win a lot of different ways,” she said. “People have played us differently and we’ve accepted the challenge and figured out a way to win, especially when we haven’t shot the ball great or maybe we had some turnover issues. We found a way to win, and we didn’t play a shabby schedule either.”

Later she was asked about the Gamecocks’ identity.

“We’re a hard-nosed basketball team that can gut out different styles of play, whether we’re being pressured, or we’re applying pressure, or someone sits back in a zone, or a gap defense, I don’t think it bothers us as much,” Staley said. “We’re able to adjust. That’s a mark of a really good team.”

3. Free Throws
South Carolina shot a dismal 18-34 from the foul line against ECU. That 52.9% performance was a season-low, but hardly an outlier. 

South Carolina is shooting just 63.8% from the line this season. That’s next-to-last in the SEC and 312th out of 348 teams in the country. That is, no matter how you spin it, not good.

Feagin (8-15 from the line this season) and Johnson (5-7) agreed that making free throws is a mental issue. 

South Carolina shoots free throws at the end of every practice, and the coaches randomly stop practice to shoot free throws in an attempt to simulate a game-like scenario.

Ironically, South Carolina shot a season-high 76.9% (10-13) against Bowling Green, the game before ECU. So it is possible.

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4. New face
For the second season in a row, the Gamecocks are adding a player midseason. 2024 post Adhel Tac joined the Gamecocks on Wednesday. 

Last season, Chloe Kitts enrolled in December, but that is where the similarities end. Kitts played right away, using up a year of eligibility. Tac will likely redshirt the rest of this season and still have four years of eligibility remaining.

Tac dislocated her kneecap and tore her MPFL on Nov. 10, ending her senior season. She also missed her junior season due to a fracture in her right foot but returned to the court last summer. Enrolling now allows Tac to rehabilitate her injuries under the supervision of Molly Binetti and Craig Oates, who run South Carolina’s highly respected strength and conditioning program.

The estimated recovery time for Tac’s injuries is 8-12 weeks. That timeline means she could potentially return to the court before the end of the season, but it seems highly unlikely Tac would be ready to contribute without practicing or playing.

Former Gamecock Laeticia Amihere faced a similar situation when she tore her ACL, ending her senior season. She enrolled in January to take advantage of the medical care South Carolina could provide, redshirting that first season. Coincidentally, Tac will wear number 15, Amihere’s old number.

5. Scouting the Gators
Florida quietly had a pretty nice non-conference season (including a strong early signing period). The Gators are an impressive 43rd in the NET rankings and have the third-best scoring offense in the SEC.

Aliyah Matharu is averaging 19.0 points, and it only seems like she has been around for ten years. Ra Shaya Kyle is averaging 13.3 points and 10.1 rebounds, giving Florida a post presence to go with Matharu and make Florida less reliant on the three ball than they were last season.

“They’re good,” Staley said. “They’re big, they’re athletic, they can play a lot of different defenses. They can score from outside the three and they can attack the basket.”

The Ws
Who: #1 South Carolina (12-0) at Florida (9-3)
When: 7:00 pm, Thursday, January 4
Where: Exactech Arena, Gainesville, FL
Watch: SEC Network

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