Frank Martin-less Gamecocks fall just short against LSU in return from COVID pause
There’s been no rhythm to South Carolina’s season. Most of the storylines surrounding the Gamecocks have been about the games they’ve missed due to COVID-19, and not the games they’ve played.
Before Saturday night, USC had played two games in 41 days — and barely practiced in between.
The Gamecocks flew to Baton Rouge on Saturday to take on a 9-2 LSU team without their head coach Frank Martin, assistant coach Chuck Martin and student-athlete development director Doug Edwards. Martin watched the game from home, recovering from his second bout with COVID-19, which — in his words — kicked his tail. Fifth-year USC assistant Bruce Shingler acted as the head coach.
Yet through it all, the Gamecocks found a way to not only play an actual basketball game, but to match one of the top teams in the Southeastern Conference blow for blow.
The Gamecocks held a lead for most of the contest but fell short to LSU, 85-80, after the Tigers’ late-game surge.
“I learned that our guys can handle adversity,” Shingler said. “Whatever situation that they put themselves in, they’ll give 100% effort. That’s our DNA. That’s our culture. That’s from our leadership of Frank Martin. So I didn’t expect anything less than their best, but we got a lot of things that we need to build off of.”
LSU entered the game ranked second in the Southeastern Conference with 86.2 points per game, yet it was the Gamecocks who seized control of the game early. USC matched nearly every LSU stat — the Tigers shot 46% from the field; the Gamecocks shot 45%. USC out-rebounded LSU 39 to 37. The Tigers had 10 steals; the Gamecocks had nine.
Where LSU had an advantage was in its conditioning. The Tigers have played twice as many games as USC this season, and the Gamecocks offense stalled late in the contest as legs started to cramp and fatigue began to build up.
But Shingler, even though he was unexpectedly thrust into the head-coaching role, didn’t make excuses after the game.
“It’s a learning experience for me,” Shingler said. “I’ve never been in that seat before, so to be thrown into the fire, it was an unbelievable experience. I thought the guys fought their tails off. I wish I could have helped the ball go in for them late. I wish I could have maybe drew up a set or two to execute a basket. But I thought our effort was there. I thought we at least tried.
“The ball didn’t go in, but it went in for the first half. So I guess I was a good coach in the first half, and in the last seven minutes maybe I was not so good. But it is what it is.”
3 Observations from USC-LSU
1. Bryant explodes in return
Junior forward Keyshawn Bryant hasn’t played a basketball game since Dec. 5 at Houston.
The entire team was sidelined from Dec. 5 until Jan. 2. But when the Gamecocks briefly returned to play two games at home — wins against Florida A&M and Texas A&M — Bryant was noticeably absent.
Martin hasn’t discussed specific cases of COVID-19 on his roster due to privacy, but he did say before the season that if a player suddenly missed two weeks, one could probably read between the lines.
Bryant’s presence was sorely missed in a thin USC frontcourt, and he made an immediate impact upon his return Saturday. Though he didn’t start, Bryant quickly played his way into more minutes on the court. He set a new career-high with four blocks in his first 15 minutes on the court. And then he took off from an offensive standpoint, shattering his previous career-high of 20 points with 26 to go along with seven rebounds.
Bryant didn’t talk about the specifics of his time away from the court, saying those six weeks are in the past.
“I learned that this team’s got experience and we’re together as a team as a whole,” Bryant said. “That’s a good thing going on the road. So we’re not gonna hang our heads after this game.”
The Gamecocks were still missing junior forward Alanzo Frink on Saturday night, who also missed the two home games earlier in the month. Also missing was sophomore forward Jalyn McCreary, who had returned in the win against Texas A&M. Shingler said he didn’t know if those players would return for Tuesday’s game at Missouri.
Reserves T.J. Moss and Nathan Nelson also returned to action for the Gamecocks on Saturday.
2. Lawson stays hot
In a season defined by unpredictability, junior guard A.J. Lawson has been among the lone constants for USC.
His career-high 30-point effort against Texas A&M fueled a Gamecocks win in their first SEC game of the season. At a time when South Carolina is struggling to simply field a complete roster, Lawson has been playing perhaps the best basketball of his career.
He entered Saturday night with a team-leading 17.8 points per game, and Lawson scored 18 in the first half alone, making seven of 12 field-goal attempts and sinking half of his eight 3-point looks. The long and lean 6-foot-6 guard created explosive plays in transition and tallied five steals.
However, Lawson cooled off in the second half, making just one of his seven field-goal attempts as the Tigers pushed their way back into the game. Lawson finished with 22 points.
3. Running out of gas
Before Saturday, LSU had four players scoring at least 13.9 points per game. Freshman guard Cameron Thomas entered as the SEC’s leading scorer with 21.8 points per game.
Considering the Tigers’ explosiveness, the Gamecocks did well to hold LSU scoreless for the first 2:38 of the game. Even more, the Gamecocks held a lead for 33:49 of the game’s 40 minutes.
LSU’s scorers were too talented to hold down forever, though. Thomas finished with 25 points after a somewhat tepid start, and forward Trendon Watford followed closely behind him with 23.
The USC offense sputtered in the final minutes of the game, as the Tigers went on an 8-0 run with three minutes left to snatch the victory. Shingler said the Gamecocks became “too stagnant with the ball,” settling too quickly for shots after a single pass.
“Offense is rhythm,” Shingler said. “It’s flow. It’s being out there. We’ve been away from each other. We have limited game experience.”
Shingler said fatigue likely played a factor at the end of the game, too, which is understandable given that the team is coming off its third separate COVID-19 pause.
“We are not (a team) of excuses,” Shingler said. “But we are one of reality. And reality is that we’ve practiced 25%, which is less than an hour, on Tuesday. We practiced 50%, which is about an hour, on Wednesday. We were able to have a full practice on Thursday, and then try to at least save some legs for Friday and Saturday.
“... Reality says you gotta imagine that guys’ legs — I mean, it showed. Guys cramped. Guys were fatigued. And like I said I’m not here to make excuses, but I do think that our good guys probably got a little tired late.”
Next USC basketball game
Who: South Carolina (3-3, 1-1 SEC) at Missouri (8-2, 2-2, SEC)
Where: Columbia, Missouri
When: 7 p.m. Tuesday
Watch: SEC Network
This story was originally published January 16, 2021 at 10:48 PM.
