CLEMSON — For Clemson fans, the first half was exciting.
For fans of South Carolina women’s basketball who made the trip to LittleJohn Coliseum on Wednesday, it was concerning at times, mainly in the first half.
The No. 1 Gamecocks (5-0) defeated Clemson 77-45 for their 43-straight victory, a new program record.
The win was somewhat ugly, as the Tigers (3-1) got the better half of South Carolina for most of the first half, especially in the opening quarter.
The Tigers had far more energy and on offense, forcing the Gamecocks into poor shots. Even when they got a clean look, they didn’t finish, shooting 5-of-21 from the field in the first quarter.
By the five-minute mark of the second quarter, South Carolina had missed 12 layups. Then with about 4:58 left, it went on a 17-0 run to close the slow and sloppy first half.
“You’re getting everyone’s best at the beginning of the game and sometimes we get out of sorts, sometimes we are more tight than we need to be,” South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said. “Simplifying, I think were just trying to do too much, play too fast, I think Clemson made us play at its pace and it was kind of frantic for us.”
Inconsistencies have flooded the offense for the Gamecocks and there is just a lack of connectivity at times.
Clemson essentially just collapsed whenever South Carolina was inside the 3-point line. The Gamecocks run a lot of dribble handoffs so they struggled with flow and it ended up being a lot of 1-on-1 takes to the basket, and many missed layups.
South Carolina had the same amount of turnovers as it did assists and finished just 33-of-77 from the field.
Staley said last week that the guards weren’t connected for some reason, and Wednesday it was evident that the issue hasn’t cleared up. Raven Johnson finished 2-of-7 from the field, as she’s now 7-of-35. MiLaysia Fulwiley had a season-low seven points.
Get the News Alerts newsletter in your inbox.
Delivery: Varies
“It’s the beginning of the season, people are playing us a lot differently, last year we played free because we had no pressure on us, nobody was thinking about us,” Staley said. “We’re just still trying to get our footing, they’re getting better, I have no doubt that we’ll start clicking.”
On defense, South Carolina didn’t suffer, and the Tigers finished 13-of-51 from the field, having more turnovers at 19 than made baskets.
“When we want to get going on offense, we have to get stops on defense, that’s how we have to start games from now on … when we have fast starts on defense, locked in, we have pretty good offense,” said South Carolina guard Te-Hina Paopao, who finished with a team-high 13 points.
Ashlyn Watkins added 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Gamecocks.
The Gamecocks had 14 points off turnovers, and held Clemson to three points off the bench, 10 points in the paint and mirrored their physical defense, allowing just five made layups all game.
“I think our defense is a little bit better than our offense right now,” said Staley. “Not a bad place to be because we know we can hit shots … we’re just not doing it at an efficient clip but we’ll figure it out.”
