What Lamont Paris said after South Carolina's season-opening loss to North Florida

Following a 74-71 loss to North Florida in the season opener, South Carolina head coach Lamont Paris spoke to the media about his team’s performance and where things went wrong. Here’s what he had to say.

— Sure the metrics are really going to like this outcome as far as the Gamecocks are concerned. Helpfully this will be good for them. Thinks they were outplayed in a lot of different ways. It’s okay not to play well. Thats going to happen at times. But as competitors, North Florida dominated them.

— Knew North Florida was a scrappy bunch. Their DNA is how hard they play and compete. Every loose ball, they were their first. That’s DNA.

— If he’s being honest, last night had him really worried about what to expect from North Florida. They did all the right things. Multiple guys didn’t have a good day at the office.

— Some guys shoot better free throws than others. Others can improve over time. It’s a one-game sample size. They’re not going to shoot like they did today all the time. When your name gets called at the free throw line, stand up. You have to go up there and make them. They had some lack of discipline plays also. It was his dream going all season without fouling on a three-point shot and they only made it into game one before doing that.

— It’s hard to coach effort. Not a big fan of coaching effort. They approach the game the same way regardless of who they play. Maybe part of it was hyping them up too much for this game.

— They have to play better. They have to pass and catch better. You do a scouting report. They don’t just go out to the court and go willy nilly. They watch film, do a scouting report on the opponent. Thinks it’s about the attention to detail. Interested to see how many of the offensive rebounds were long rebounds. They got off to a slow start and the energy was not great. Knows the vibe when it’s like okay here we are. Didn’t feel like they felt that throughout the game.

— Agrees that the sky is not falling. It’s history. They could’ve also won the game. The metrics still didn’t like them last year when they lost one game in non-conference play. They’ve just got to play. Focus on improvement. This helps force you to look at the loss and why the game ended up in a situation that it was.

— They’ll troubleshoot all the time when in reference to a question about playing time. Guys will have to earn what they’re doing out there. The prized possession is playing in the final minutes. They’ll have to show and demonstrate where that’s where they should be. They’ll try to find the perfect mix of what the lineup is.

— Definitely earned exactly what they got today. They got what they earned ultimately on the way they played.

— Thinks they’ll go back to fundamentals. Doesn’t have a lot of frustration in games because guys normally do what they have done. Doesnt really get that frustrated with poor play on game day. But does get frustrated having to repeat himself over and over. These things he says, you need evidence that they are true sometimes. So that’s what where they’ll start (fouling on the three-point shot). Would like to have those points back. Pump faking. They did it twice jumping on those. They easily could’ve flipped those around by the way they practiced and what they talked about going into this game.

— A strength of last year’s team was locking into the small details that allowed them to win games. The challenge will be helping acknowledge the value of those things and how they relate to winning. Has to do a better job of that on his end.

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