South Carolina falls to No. 23 Tennessee in home finale. Lamont Paris reacts

South Carolina men’s basketball hosted No. 23 Tennessee at Colonial Life Arena on Tuesday night for its regular-season home finale and the Gamecocks’ annual Senior Night ceremony.

USC wasn’t able to send its seniors or fans off on a high note. The Gamecocks lost 78-59 to the Volunteeers. Here’s what Gamecock coach Lamont Paris had to say about the loss:

Letter from Meechie Johnson

The biggest narrative of note after Senior Night, despite the loss, was Meechie Johnson having played his last home game as a Gamecock. Johnson, who spent three seasons with USC in between stints at Ohio State, clearly had developed a close relationship with Paris. Johnson said he wrote a letter to Paris before the game to thank Paris for everything he’d done.

Paris shared similar sentiments about his fondness for Johnson, but said he hadn’t yet read the letter.

“This was maybe an hour before I was going to come over here to the arena, and he dropped off a note. I said, ‘Well, should I read it now? When should I read it?’ He said, ‘Whenever you want, coach.’ And so I did not read the letter because I had an idea of what it would potentially say, and I didn’t want to be emotional going into the locker room before we come over and play a game. So I will read that when I get back, over to my office when I get back,” Paris said.

“He’s a great kid. It’s definitely easier for kids to express themselves that way this year, but honestly, it also says a lot that he put pen to paper, versus a quick text or something like that.”

Paris said Johnson’ maturity was the reason Johnson averaged career highs in points and assists per game this season.

“He had a host of health issues when he arrived to campus. So, as a matter of fact, he didn’t do most of the summer workouts with us. He had three different things going on at one time, any one of which would have put him out for for a good amount of time. But luckily for us, they all were happening at the same time. So really it was only as long as the longest one. But his whole perspective during that time, and the maturity that he displayed during that time, it was a different person than what I remembered even from when he left the last time, just a completely different level of maturity and perspective.

“And I think that really has impacted how he’s played,” Paris said. “It’s a tremendous story, honestly, let’s forget about basketball and all the other things. It’s a tremendous story of perseverance and of being true to yourself, because he wanted to be back here.

“There was a lot of outside noises, and you know, ‘Oh, you’re going to do this and do that, and then do this again, and then go back to this.’ He was scrutinized heavily for that, and so for him to be able to quiet that noise in a way that he could really dive into his team and his coaches, and just his whole experience in this last year, being back here in Columbia, said a lot about who he was as a person. And it’s a great story,” Paris said. “ For young people, perception is reality, and so obstacles that maybe back in the Dark Ages, when I was young, were not perceived as big as obstacles, are real obstacles for these guys.

“As I mentioned before, (players are) not tremendous communicators. They don’t communicate near as much in a way, that we communicated (when Paris was a player). So they’re scrutinized way more than I ever was. They got all these things happening, and it makes it difficult in so many situations. And so I give Meechie a lot of credit. He’s been a tremendous example for the guys on our team, he’s an incredible communicator with his voice to his teammates, his energy is always good,” Paris said. “You never know what anyone’s going through at any particular point in time. It’s just facts, we perceive that we know what a guy like he is going through, because we see it publicly, when you really have no clue what’s happening beneath the surface. And so I give him a lot of credit for how he’s handled and managed and then still been able to play at the level that he was able to play and be a tremendous example for his teammates.”

Senior night

Aside from Johnson, Paris said he thinks his staff did a solid job of developing his seniors in just one year. All six of his seniors either played on a different team last season, weren’t with the team, or were out due to injury. Paris used Johnson, Mike Sharavjamts and Kobe Knox as the three prime examples of his players developing over the season.

“I don’t want to leave any of those guys out, but there’s three examples right off the top, that if you just want to glance at a stat sheet and then look at this guy and look at what he was doing a year before, it’s undeniable and tremendous growth out of those guys. I still value development. I think you have to have a good combination of some guys that are pretty much ready to go. But that doesn’t mean that they still can’t develop,” Paris said. “It’s a part of what this is. It’s my favorite part of what this job is, is impacting those guys. ... We did a good job. There’s some other guys that maybe that hasn’t grown as much and or their growth was not displayed in their stats. Their growth was not evident by what their numbers look like when they shot from 3, or what they average as points. But those three that I mentioned before stand out clearly as guys that even statistically have made tremendous growth in a one-year situation.”

This story was originally published March 3, 2026 at 9:02 PM.