Breaking in to the AP Poll’s Top 25 at #20 and sitting at the top of the SEC with a 6-1 record things are going pretty well for the Florida Gators and they look to keep it going on Wednesday, January 24th when they take on the South Carolina Gamecocks in Gainesville. Departures of many key players makes this Gamecocks squad a shell of the team that dispatched Florida in the Elite Eight last season but I’m sure the returning Gators would still like to get some sweet revenge on the team that robbed them of a Final Four opportunity. Additionally, South Carolina is a team currently tied for 7th in the SEC and Florida needs to protect their home floor because, well, that is what the number one team in the SEC needs to do. Let’s take a dive into the numbers to see what we can expect on Wednesday.
Season to Date
South Carolina coach Frank Martin has never been interested in playing a difficult non-conference schedule and it led to them having a pretty vanilla start to the season. Losses to 164th ranked KenPom team Illinois State and 91st ranked Temple tarnished their resume and they were left without any great opportunities to make up those losses. They did have one common non-conference opponent with the Gators as they went to Clemson to take on the Tigers where they dropped a brutal 64-48 contest that was a slow and ugly enough basketball game to make your eyes bleed. South Carolina has fared decently well in the difficult SEC getting a big home win against Kentucky and they are coming off a hard fought game with Tennessee where they lost 70-63.
Offense
If you love offensive basketball, you might want to close your eyes during South Carolina’s possessions on Wednesday. One of the worst shooting teams in the nation, the Gamecocks are 305th in 2-point field goal percentage (45.7%), 287th in 3-point percentage (32.4%), and 291st in free throw percentage (67.2%, but hey, hopefully this is a game Florida can improve their free throw defense percentage!). Honestly, when you look at how bad those shooting percentages are it’s almost impressive that they are able to still be a middle of the pack SEC team. With so many missed shots, Frank Martin has his team hitting the offensive glass at every opportunity. Grabbing 34% of available offensive rebounds, Florida will need to be extremely disciplined in picking up bodies to box out when a shot goes up. The Gators were able to compete on the glass against a really good rebounding Kentucky team and they’ll need to show that same fight against a South Carolina team that thrives on easy put backs to make up for their dismal shooting. Frank Martin’s teams are almost always among the toughest in the country and you can bet he wants his guys to physically dominate you on the glass. Another way they like to show their toughness is by getting inside and trying to bully opponents around the hoop. Though they aren’t a particularly skilled team which leads them to miss a lot of shots around the rim, they draw a ton of fouls. Going to the line the 3rd most of any team in college basketball, you can be happy that they are such a poor shooting team from the line (67.2% as discussed before). It won’t make for great television, but if you are a Gators fan then you should be happy that Florida gets to play against such a poor offense that should hopefully build their defensive confidence.
Defense
Though I’m not a fan of the way South Carolina plays offense, man do I ever love watching them defend. The calling card of Frank Martin coached teams has always been their defense and this year’s team definitely keeps up to that expectation. Staying focused for the entirety of their opponent’s possession and never getting out of a defensive stance, this is a diligent group of players that has made South Carolina the 25th best team in the country at defensive efficiency. Mostly playing a “deny” style of man defense where they make passing the ball around the perimeter difficult it could be challenging for the Gators to run offense. We saw this style of defense played earlier in the conference season by Missouri and it gave the Gators a lot of problems. Seeing it before will hopefully make this an improved effort against the “deny” man defense, but I think South Carolina is even better at it then Missouri was so it could still be really difficult. The Gamecocks will also play a zone that resembles a 2-3 that morphs into a 3-2 depending on where the ball is and it’s a defense that I think has been really good for them. If they do play zone, watch for how well the Gamecocks communicate with each other on the floor so everyone knows where shooters and cutters are. Mike White has spoke all season about how the Gators need to communicate better and playing against South Carolina should give them a look at what it really looks like to communicate on defense. Hey, if South Carolina is going to frustrate the Gators for 40 minutes on Wednesday then why not try to at least learn something from them? Another area that could come into play is how well South Carolina defends in transition. The Gamecocks limit their opponents to only 40.1% shooting in transition, an area where almost every team in the league allows over 50%. Their success in transition defense, much like their zone defense, comes from the way they communicate and are able to figure out who is covering who on the run. Lastly, the Gators are going to have to be prepared to get fouled hard and fouled often. South Carolina loves to hammer opponents to not allow easy buckets and will foul often knowing that there is no way the refs are going to blow the whistle every single time there is contact. It will be an incredibly physical game and it’s a challenge the Gators will have to rise to.
Turnover Battle
Florida is one of the best teams in the country at taking care of the ball with a turnover rate of 13.9% while South Carolina is one of the best teams in the country at forcing turnovers with a defensive turnover rate of 22.1%. Turnover margin is huge in college basketball, and whoever wins this battle between a team that takes care of the ball well and a team who forces lots of turnovers could very well be the victor.
Best Gamecock
Chris Silva. The 6’9”, 223 pound junior is a beast who plays exclusively at the power forward spot and uses the size advantage he has over most four men to put up 14.5 points, 7.8 rebounds, and 1.2 blocked shots per game. South Carolina doesn’t have a lot of offensive threats so they often go to Silva down low to try to generate in the post. His finishing inside isn’t too bad, but he is college basketball’s king of drawing fouls (currently #2 in fouls drawn per 40 minutes and #1 in free throw rate) so he does a lot of work at the charity stripe. His ability to draw contact could put the Gators in some serious foul trouble which would allow South Carolina’s much bigger frontcourt to really go to work against second string players.
Florida’s Keys to the Game
Defending without fouling will be really key as South Carolina is such a poor shooting team that you don’t ever want to bail them out with chances to get easy points at the line. Since South Carolina shoots so poorly controlling the offensive glass would also go a long way in securing this game. Florida was able to compete with Kentucky when it came to rebounding and they’ll have to bring that same effort.
How do you think the Gators are going to fair against the Gamecocks? Leave a comment here or post on the Gator Country forums.