South Carolina basketball coach Lamont Paris and his team have one of the hardest opening stretches to SEC play of any team in the conference. They've already passed the first test with a home win over Mississippi State, but the gauntlet continued on Tuesday night on the road at Alabama.
The game was a matchup between two contrasting styles (Alabama is 2nd in the country in scoring offense, and South Carolina basketball is 18th in the nation in scoring defense) and two of the conference's best guards as Meechie Johnson and Mark Sears (two of the SEC's top-3 scorers) squared off.
The contest began with the Gamecocks winning the tip, but it was Alabama's Aaron Estrada who opened the scoring with a wing 3-pointer. Back-to-back makes from Ta'Lon Cooper and BJ Mack earned the lead for USC. A few possessions later, Cooper hit a 3-pointer, and Meechie Johnson had a steal and coast-to-coast layup. In the blink of an eye, Carolina was up 10-3.
Sears and Cooper traded 3-point shots (Cooper was up to 8 points already), and heading into the first media timeout, South Carolina led 13-6. 2 free throws for Sears followed the break before the game devolved into three straight turnovers (two for the 'Cocks, one for the 'Tide).
After missing the last game with a hip pointer, Benjamin Bosmans-Verdonk checked in early against Nate Oats' team and quickly grabbed 3 rebounds. After Alabama's 6th turnover, freshman Collin Murray-Boyles got on the board with a strong post take. With just over 12 minutes left in the half, Carolina led 15-8.
BJ Mack got caught behind a screen giving Mark Sears a wide open 3-pointer, and then after a scoreless couple of minutes, Nick Pringle and Rylan Griffen scored back-to-back bucket to bring Alabama's run to 8-0, lighting Coleman Coliseum on fire and giving 'Bama the lead 16-15.
Meechie Johnson ended the run with a tough runner in the lane, and then two teams traded buckets before another timeout. 19-19 was the score with 6:51 left in the 1st half.
The Gamecock defense earned a few more stops, and then a ridiculous end-of-clock fallaway from Sears riled up the crowd before Johnson quieted them with an aggressive take to the rim.
A few possessions later, a Latrell Wrightsell 3-pointer gave 'Bama a 28-27 lead, and the two teams traded buckets before a deep Meechie Johnson 3-ball didn't fall at the final horn of the half. For the first time all season, the Gamecocks were trailing at halftime, 30-29.
After halftime, Sears picked up where he left off with a deep 3-pointer to push his team's lead to 4 points. The Gamecocks, though, missed their first 10 shots (meaning they were 1 for their last 17), and the Crimson Tide made more than their fair share of shots to make the score 43-29 with 13:30 left in the half. It was the first time all season that the Gamecocks trailed by double-digits.
Meechie Johnson stopped the bleeding with a 3-pointer, but Alabama stayed hot. Making 6 of 7 shots, compared to just 2 makes from the Gamecocks, gave Lamont Paris' squad a seemingly out-of-reach 13-point deficit.
The lead grew to 20 points before the Gamecocks scored again. Horrendous offensive play and slow-rotating defense are a bad combination, especially against a team like Alabama. The run got up to 24-5 with 8:56 left in the game.
A really deep 3-pointer from Meechie Johnson helped a little, but then neither team scored for a while as they combined for 8 turnovers in just over five minutes of gameplay. Playing with a big lead, that played to the advantage of Alabama. By the time Alabama scored with 6:00 left in the game, the score stood 57-37.
The rest of the game was an uncomfortable watch as the Gamecocks were somehow even worse than they were during their horrible start to the half. Had Alabama not been coasting to the finish line, the final score would have been outright embarrassing. Even as it was, the Crimson Tide won handily as the Gamecocks scored just 18 points in the 2nd half.
South Carolina Basketball vs. Alabama Crimson Tide
Stats, Scoring, and Observations
South Carolina basketball followed up their win over Mississippi State from Saturday with a great 1st half against the Alabama Crimson Tide. However, a horrible 2nd half (by far, the Gamecocks' worst half of the season) allowed the home Alabama team to embarrass Carolina by almost 30 points, 74-47.
Here are the stats from the game:
STATS
Alabama
Points
Leader: Mark Sears with 31
Rebounds
Leader: Aaron Estrada with 7
Assists
Leader: Mark Sears and Rylan Griffen with 3 each
Steals
Leader: Mark Sears with 3
Blocks
Leader: Nick Pringle with 2
Other
Mark Sears scored 31 points on just 13 shot attempts (10-13/6-8/5-5); The Crimson Tide outscored the Gamecocks 44-18 in the 2nd half; Myles Stute (0-3), Stephen Clark (0-2), and BJ Mack (2-10) combined for just 7 points on 15 shots and 7 turnovers in 64 minutes
South Carolina
Points
Leader: Meechie Johnson with 16
Rebounds
Leader: BJ Mack with 6
Assists
Leader: Myles Stute and Meechie Johnson with 2 each
Steals
Leader: Ta'Lon Cooper with 3
Blocks
Leader: Josh Gray with 1
Other
The Gamecocks shot 31% from the field and 20% from behind the 3-point line; they finished the game with 17 turnovers
OBSERVATIONS
- Starters: Ta’Lon Cooper-Meechie Johnson-Myles Stute-BJ Mack-Stephen Clark
- BJ Mack was active early. Ta'Lon Cooper was very aggressive, scoring 8 points in the first 4 minutes.
- The Gamecock defense played very well. Unfortunately, Mark Sears made multiple difficult shots to keep the game tight in the 1st half.
- The 1st half was pretty clean. The officials let the players play, but the two teams also played under control (other than the combined 14 turnovers).
- Carolina had 6 offensive boards (compared to just 1 for Alabama) in the 1st half.
- Mark Sears was ridiculous in the 1st half, scoring 15 of his team's 30 points. Meechie Johnson, Ta'Lon Cooper, and BJ Mack combined for 23 of Carolina's 29.
- The game favored the USC style for the 1st 20 minutes as the 'Tide was held to just 30 points in the 1st half, more in line with Carolina's defensive averages than Alabama's offensive ones.
- A disastrous start to the 2nd half saw the Gamecocks miss their first 10 shots. The run made it to 24-5 in favor of Alabama over the first 11 minutes of the period.
- The rest of the game was non-competitive, and USC didn't show much fight. Carolina got dominated in every phase after the halftime break.