Frank Martin explains why Chris Silva only played 13 seconds down stretch of MSU loss
When Chris Silva checked back into Saturday’s game with 3:56 remaining, the only thing that would bring him back to South Carolina’s bench was a fifth foul. The Gamecocks were down 11 points and their best shot for a sixth successful rally from a double-digit deficit this SEC season would include their star forward.
Right?
Frank Martin wasn’t thinking that way when he pulled Silva 13 seconds later for failing to properly execute a play. The big man never returned to the floor.
“I put him in the game there coming out of the timeout and I told those guys what I wanted to run coming out of that timeout,” the USC coach said after the 76-61 loss to MSU. “He chose to run his own play and break our play off. I’m not dealing with that. I don’t care how good of a player he is.
“He didn’t play well today. It had nothing to do with foul trouble today. We come out of a timeout and my freshman executes what I call ... I expect (Silva) to execute what I call, too.”
The possession Martin’s alluding to was paused when rookie A.J. Lawson was trapped by two Bulldogs in the short corner of the floor while Silva hovered around the elbow. MSU’s Q Weatherspoon eventually knocked the ball out of Lawson’s hands and out of bounds. Before the Gamecocks inbounded, Silva was replaced by Maik Kotsar.
Silva finished with five points and one rebound as USC (14-13, 9-5 SEC) fell back into a tie with Ole Miss for fourth place in the league standings. The underwhelming performance snapped a four-game streak for Silva when he averaged over 18 points and 10 boards. That 13-second cameo? It’s all the senior logged over the game’s final eight minutes.
A closer in recent wins over Texas A&M and Arkansas, Silva was a non-factor in crunch time.
“He was in foul trouble and we were trying to go at him offensively just for that reason,” said MSU coach Ben Howland, “because he’s foul-prone.”
Silva committed at least four fouls for the 17th time this season. He’s up to 454 fouls in his career. According to SportsReference, that’s the fourth-most by any college basketball player of the last 10 years. He’s 13 whistles shy of becoming the unfortunate No. 1 in that category.
Little production from Silva was part of USC’s third-lowest scoring output of the season. Hassani Gravett (six) was held seven points below his season average in SEC play. He didn’t make a 3 for the first time in five games. Four of USC’s five SEC losses have come when Gravett’s failed to reach 10 points.
“I didn’t feel he was engaged offensively as he’s been,” Martin said. “But we tried to run our staff. Give them credit. They would not let us come off a screen and get open.”
After making their first two shots of the second half to build a 12-point lead, the Gamecocks went 6 for 23 over the final 18:22.
This story was originally published February 24, 2019 at 9:24 AM.
