South Carolina Basketball: 3 thumbs up, 3 thumbs down from Missouri win

For the second straight game, Dawn Staley's South Carolina basketball team won in convincing fashion in an SEC game despite playing far below their standard. The Gamecocks knocked off Missouri 81-57 in a game that was closer most of the way than that final score would indicate.

A career high (and efficient masterclass) from Bree Hall and another elite shooting day for her and Te-Hina Paopao carried the day offensive for the Gamecocks. The rest of the showing was inconsistent from Carolina as there were stretches in which the team couldn't score, and there were stretches in which they struggled to get stops on defense.

However, the struggles were amplified by some horrific officiating and lots of flopping from the Missouri Tigers. Amazingly, the Gamecocks were only called for 13 fouls, even though it seemed like half of them were clearly bogus calls (to be fair, the referees were not great in ways that favored the Gamecocks at times, too).

The Gamecocks did not have their best rebounding game in the "other Columbia," but they did enough to win that battle anyway. The perimeter defense struggled, as well, but there is no reason to panic for USC fans.

The reality of this game is this: South Carolina basketball did not play particularly well, and they still beat an SEC team on the road by 24 points.

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