In a scoring slump, South Carolina’s Meechie Johnson gets encouragement from NBA star
Stuck in a two-game scoring slump, Meechie Johnson received some encouragement from an NBA star.
Johnson said New Orleans Pelicans guard CJ McCollum reached out to him this week on social media as he is mired in a scoring slump. The South Carolina guard and McCollum, the NBA’s Most Improved Player in 2016, know each other from their Ohio roots. Johnson is from Cleveland and McCollum was raised in Canton.
“He told me to stay hungry, stay humble and keep putting in the work,” Johnson said Thursday after USC’s practice. “That is something my granddad has preached to me since I was a kid so I appreciated it.”
Johnson, the team’s leading scorer at 15.1 points a game, has scored just three points over the last two games in wins against Missouri and the upset at No. 5 Tennessee. That is the lowest output over a two-game stretch since he arrived at USC last year.
The last time Johnson had that kind of stretch was his 2020-21 sophomore season at Ohio State.
Johnson said he has spent the last couple days working on his shot at game pace and trying to get his confidence back.
“I have been in slumps before, so it is nothing new to me,” Johnson said. “Just getting back to the basic fundamentals of my shot. I can do so many other things to help my team. I feel once that (scoring) gets going, it is going to be uglier for opponents.”
Johnson has been one of the Gamecocks’ go-to options over the past two years and scored more than 20 points in six games this season.
With the scoring off the last few games, that hasn’t hurt Johnson’s ability to contribute in other ways. In Tuesday’s win over Tennessee, he had six rebounds and six assists. Two of Johnson’s assists came late in the game when he dished to Ta’Lon Cooper for a pair of 3-pointers, and the second one put the Gamecocks up 59-53 with 41 seconds left.
“He doesn’t feel the pressure that he has to score 20 points or we aren’t going to win. And just him diving into the role as facilitator when his shot isn’t going in the way it would like it too,” USC coach Lamont Paris said of Johnson on his Thursday night radio call-in show. “On some of our biggest baskets (against Tennessee), he generated them and drew a crowd and kicked it to wide open guys.
“Just want him to be positive and be confident enough that you can continue to help a game as a rebounder, facilitator, and creator for others. That keeps you locked in. .. It was good he was able to be a contributor.”
Johnson said several times Thursday that he will do whatever it takes to keep the team’s momentum going. The Gamecocks have won four straight games, two over ranked opponents, and are a game back of first-place Alabama in the Southeastern Conference standings going into Saturday’s matchup at Georgia.
“The team is winning and we are doing great things,” Johnson said. “I’m not letting the last couple games affect my shooting or scoring. I know I can score and it will come when it comes.”
Next four games
- Feb. 3 at Georgia, 1 p.m. (SEC Network)
- Feb. 6 vs. Ole Miss, 6:30 p.m. (SEC Network)
- Feb. 10 vs. Vanderbilt, 1 p.m. (SEC Network)
- Feb. 14 at Auburn, 8:30 p.m. (SEC Network)
This story was originally published February 2, 2024 at 7:00 AM.
