After surviving early tests, Dawn Staley says No. 1 Gamecocks ‘found their edge’
The 2020-21 schedule for South Carolina women’s basketball technically started Nov. 25 against College of Charleston. But for Dawn Staley’s No. 1 Gamecocks, the season really began this past weekend in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
That’s where Staley took her top-ranked squad to play in the Bad Boy Mowers Crossover Classic once the COVID-19 pandemic canceled their previously scheduled trip to the Bahamas. And it’s where, with all due respect to Charleston, USC got its first taste of high-level competition.
With an 81-71 win over a South Dakota program that earned votes in the preseason polls and a 79-72 victory over No. 21 Gonzaga, South Carolina has already faced some significant challenges that last year’s historically great team never had. Through all of 2019-20, the Gamecocks had just six wins by 10 or fewer points (plus one loss to Indiana), and none of those games came back to back.
“There were some question marks, there always are coming into a season and in playing in a tournament like this. And that was, what would they do when it was time to check your gut? And they checked their gut. The Gonzaga game, the South Dakota game, those were challenging opponents, challenging,” Staley said. “Some people won’t play teams like this because of, you’re susceptible to losing because they’re that good. They’re well-coached. They play every possession.
“But, you know, I thought we dug in that bag of familiarity where we were playing some great basketball last year. So I think ... it was good that this core group of players found their edge.”
There were, by Staley’s own admission, plenty of mistakes to correct. The Gamecocks shot just 58.6% from the free throw line across the weekend. A more respectable figure would have made both wins a lot more comfortable.
Their layup shooting (46.4% made) against the Coyotes was such that Staley lamented after that “unless we’re gonna push their elbows up and follow through for them in the game, I don’t know what more we can do for them.” A 43.2% performance against the Bulldogs followed.
And USC’s star player, preseason All-American forward Aliyah Boston, “did not have a very Aliyah Boston type of tournament,” Staley acknowledged. While she scored in double figures both games, she dealt with foul trouble, shot just 42.1% from the field and wasn’t quite the rebounding and shot-blocking force in the paint that she’s proven herself capable of being.
Even without Boston producing at her typical level, South Carolina found ways to win, something Staley took as a positive. USC got a star-turn performance from junior guard Destanni Henderson, who tallied 42 points, 12 rebounds and five assists across two games to earn tournament MVP honors, and sophomore guard Zia Cooke continues to grow as a play-maker capable of scoring in bunches.
The toughness of the bench players was also pleasing to Staley. Sophomore forward Laeticia Amihere generated hype in the preseason and has done a solid job thus far of backing it up, averaging 9.3 points and 8 rebounds per game in the early going.
Staley has never shied away from scheduling tough games to test her squad. The Gamecocks have faced a top-25 schedule seven years in a row now, including a ranked nonconference opponent within the first three games for six years running.
Last year against Maryland, USC had the advantage of slightly lower expectations as the lower-ranked squad and still never trailed. This year, the No. 1 Gamecocks have a much bigger target on them from the get-go but no senior starters — a difficult combination that will make every early challenge all the more daunting and revealing about this new team’s strengths and weaknesses.
“Last year’s team was really special, but also this team is really special as well,” Henderson said. “We have levels to our team, so all of us just have to find our role within the game and just to help each other. I feel like not just one person is the leader. I feel like we all can lead in our own way, so we just have to focus on that and just focus on what we need to do for our teammates.”
NEXT GAME
Who: No. 1 South Carolina (3-0) vs. No. 8 North Carolina State (2-0)
When: 7 p.m. Thursday
Where: Colonial Life Arena, Columbia, South Carolina
Watch: ESPN2
This story was originally published November 30, 2020 at 8:45 AM with the headline "After surviving early tests, Dawn Staley says No. 1 Gamecocks ‘found their edge’."
