South Carolina Basketball: Pregame Prognostications and How to Watch vs. Vanderbilt

The South Carolina basketball team finally ended their losing streak on the road against Ole Miss on Saturday. The three-point victory was the latest outing in which the Gamecocks performed better on the road than they have at home at Colonial Life Arena. Lamont Paris’ team has won road contests at Georgetown, Kentucky, and Ole Miss this season but will have to play well at home if they are looking to start a winning streak.

The Vanderbilt Commodores will travel to Columbia to take on the Gamecocks on Tuesday at 6:30 EST on the SECNetwork. Vanderbilt is riding a three-game winning streak that includes a road win in Gainesville over the Florida Gators and a home victory over top-10 Tennessee. Head Coach Jerry Stackhouse and the Commodores have fared better than the Gamecocks this season and sit around the middle of the pack in the SEC standings.

Commodore point guard Ezra Manjon has one of the most impressive assist/turnover ratios in the conference and guides the Vandy offense for almost 30 minutes per game. Pressuring him will be key for South Carolina if they hope to get stops on defense. Myles Stute and Liam Robbins are a dynamic forward duo for Stackhouse’s squad who are among the league leaders in rebounds per game (Robbins also averages around 15 points per game, and Stute sits around 10 points each time out). Josh Gray, GG Jackson, Hayden Brown, and Benjamin Bosmans-Verdonk will be tasked with the difficult assignment to defend these two studs from Nashville while also keeping them off the glass. Robbins and Stute have both missed time with injury this season, so their health and game stamina could be factors in this matchup.

An underlying storyline that is becoming increasingly more visible is the seeming rift that exists between Lamont Paris and his best player, GG Jackson. After a tough loss against Arkansas that saw the Gamecocks look completely unprepared for the end-game situation against the Razorbacks, Jackson vented his frustrations on Instagram Live. Jackson was subsequently benched for the start of the next game against Missouri, but he rebounded and played one of his best games of the year from a bench role. In the Ole Miss victory, however, Jackson was pulled after just one minute during his second stint on the floor (again not present in the starting lineup) and mildly voiced some displeasure with his odd usage. Paris effectively benched Jackson for the rest of the game as he only played twelve total minutes in the contest. Following the benching, Jackson did not respond with any outbursts but did not seem very engaged with the action on the court.

Prediction

The Gamecocks start strong, and the Jackson-Paris situation is not very consequential as the game is close in the first half. Josh Gray rebounds the ball well but eventually succumbs to foul trouble, paving the way for Robbins and Stute to do what they do for Vanderbilt. In the end, South Carolina cannot put together enough stops on defense and quality shots on offense to hold serve with the hot Commodore team.