Holding on to a 16-2 (3-2 SEC) record and coming off a bounce back performance where they cleaned up their issues against Missouri to take down Texas the Florida Gators will have a great opportunity to add another win as they head to Columbia to take on the South Carolina Gamecocks. Currently South Carolina sits dead last in the SEC at 0-5 (10-8 on the season) and is scrambling to try to make anything positive happen and Florida will look to smell blood in the water and take advantage.
The 2023-24 season was a magical one for head coach Lamont Paris and the South Carolina basketball program. Going into the season they had zero expectations and in fact were picked by the media to finish dead last in the SEC. Instead they went 26-8 finishing 5th in the SEC and making the NCAA Tournament as a 6-seed, though they were upset in the opening round by Oregon.
Despite the fact that they were bringing back most of their key players outside of guard Meechie Johnson the media had measured expectations for the Gamecocks entering 2024-25, picking them to finish 11th in the league.
So far, things couldn’t be going much worse.
In South Carolina’s opening game of the season against North Florida they got blitzed by the Ospreys’ three-point attack and lost 74-71. Their first high-major games came against Xavier and Indiana, and they were blown out in both. There was one bright spot in their non-conference schedule–a rivalry win over Clemson in overtime that had people thinking that South Carolina might be starting to figure things out. Then SEC play started, and that didn’t appear to be the case. Winless in SEC play so far the Gamecocks have lost to Mississippi State, Alabama, Auburn, Vanderbilt, and Oklahoma. The current state of the league is such that no one loss looks particularly bad in vacuum, but so far they haven’t shown much ability to be competitive with other high-major programs.
While the Gamecocks haven’t been playing a great brand of basketball this year, injuries have played a big role in their SEC struggles. Starting point guard Jamarii Thomas, a transfer from Norfolk State averaging 12.3 points and 3.3 assists, has missed the last three games and South Carolina’s offense has looked disjointed because of it. Myles Stute, a 5th year player with experience starting at Vanderbilt before heading to South Carolina, has missed the last four–and he’s by far and away their most important defensive piece. For a team already struggling, losing two key starters to injury was completely debilitating and with no known timeline of when they’ll return it’s tough to see a game on the schedule where the Gamecocks might be able to get another win in a year where the league has never been stronger.
As mentioned earlier, South Carolina was able to retain a number of key pieces from last year’s team such as 6’7” Zachary Davis, 6’2” Jacobi Wright, 6’9” Benjamin Bosmans-Verdonk, and the previously mentioned 6’6” Myles Stute. Plus, of course, last year’s freshman breakout star Collin Murray-Boyles who is quietly still playing outstanding basketball despite the fact he doesn’t have a ton of support around him. At the top of every opponent’s scouting report Murray-Boyles is facing a ton of defensive resistance but is averaging a respectable 15.4 points, 9.2 rebounds, 2.0 assists, 1.6 blocks, and 1.2 steals per game. Largely a face-up mid-point player Murray-Boyles has nice agility and ball skills in a 6’8”, 245 pound frame and it can make for some mismatches he’s able to take advantage of. If teams put larger centers on him he’s able to beat them off the dribble with skill, and if teams try to put a smaller more mobile defender on him he can play pure bully ball and shove them out of the way on post-ups. Without a lot of other players that scare you offensively, particularly if Jamarii Thomas is out once again, the Gators are going to swarm Murray-Boyles and make life as difficult as possible for him as they dare someone else to score.
Currently South Carolina is 128th in KenPom’s adjusted offensive efficiency metric and many of their issues have come on this end. In their 5-game SEC losing streak they have posted point totals of 50, 68, 63, 63, and 62–numbers that aren’t going to keep you in a lot of games unless your defense is playing at a masterful level.
If there is any reason for optimism with South Carolina it is that their defense has shown moments of quality this season. Defense was what made South Carolina so good the year prior and with a lot of those same pieces back they had the potential to be solid once again, though the injury to Myles Stute has really hurt them on that end. Stute is the versatile wing that is great on the ball or as a help side defender barking out orders and rotations and his absence can’t be understated. The Gamecocks also added some length at the center position with Alabama transfer Nick Pringle, but he hasn’t yet had the impact as a shot blocker South Carolina was hoping for.
Against a Texas team that is struggling to find its footing the Gators played responsible basketball and it resulted in a comfortable win and that could be the same script against South Carolina. The Gamecocks do have a bit more of a defined identity than Texas does with their emphasis on the defensive end, but even if they are able to slow down the Gators it’s hard to imagine a game where they muster up more points than the low 60’s they’ve averaged in recent games.
When it comes to road games in the SEC there aren’t many you should still be expecting to win but if the Gators are going to finish anywhere near the top of the league taking advantage of an injured South Carolina team on a 5-game losing streak is the kind of game they need to handle.
Florida and South Carolina will tip off Wednesday, January 22nd at 7 PM ET and it will be televised on SEC Network.