Three takeaways from Dawn Staley on South Carolina’s whirlwind Thanksgiving weekend
A chaotic Thanksgiving weekend in women’s college basketball left South Carolina sitting at No. 6 in the latest Associated Press poll, down one spot after losing to then-No. 17 Indiana but beating then-No. 2 Baylor in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Poll spots in November mean little in the grand scheme of things. But the three-game stretch the Gamecocks just went through still has plenty of teach us about where USC is and where it stands against some of the nation’s best.
“I don’t think everybody has the pulse of their team. They don’t know what their strengths and weaknesses are,” South Carolina coach Dawn Staley told reporters about the rash of upsets across the sport this past weekend. “You’re figuring those things out and trying to figure out what it is that your team is about. Like us, can we hit in the gut on Thursday and come back the next day? You’re building tough skin, and I just thought our kids were resilient.”
Here are three main takeaways from South Carolina’s weekend at the Paradise Jam.
A tale of two fourth quarters
In South Carolina’s 71-57 loss to Indiana, the Gamecocks were out-scored 24-6 in the fourth quarter. In their 74-59 win over Baylor, they won the fourth quarter 23-11.
Staley credited the team’s preparation as the key difference between those two wildly different results.
“I thought we could have packed it in and said, ‘Hey, we lost to Indiana, there’s no way we can the championship.’ But we kept our heads up and we just went back to the drawing board and practiced a little bit better, prepped a little bit better, and we put ourselves in a position to win a championship,” Staley told reporters in the Virgin Islands.
Losing senior guard Tyasha Harris and freshman forward Aliyah Boston to foul trouble late against Indiana certainly played a factor. Without them, the Gamecocks were 2-for-13 from the field and generally looked lost. Two days later, Baylor was the team in foul trouble and looking panicked as South Carolina imposed its will with a 15-2 surge to close the game.
The lesson is obvious: Foul trouble matters a whole lot. And South Carolina’s freshmen need to be smart about how they handle that tricky part of the game.
Aliyah Boston learns, bounces back
Speaking of freshmen, Staley said Boston was “near tears” after fouling out Thursday in front of friends and family in her hometown. After traveling more than 1,400 miles to visit the home she left when she was 12, spending Thanksgiving with her family and receiving the support of a raucous cheering section, Boston barely played.
The Hoosiers forced her out to the perimeter on ball screens and then exploited her with speed. The fouls she was called for weren’t egregious, but outside of the post, she looked uncomfortable and made several poor decisions reaching for the ball when she shouldn’t have.
Fast forward to Baylor, and Boston did a much better job with ball screen defense and keeping her hands up so as to avoid cheap fouls. She played 32 minutes, scored 20 points, pulled down 13 rebounds and was named tournament MVP in a whirlwind redemption story that took roughly 48 hours.
“You have to be a really strong minded person and player to have gone through what Aliyah had gone through on Thursday. She was probably near tears because she wanted to do so well for her islanders, and I wanted her to do well for them,” Staley told reporters. “They all came to see her, she wasn’t able to play because of foul trouble. You’d think a freshman who had that kind of performance, you don’t know how they’re gonna put one foot back in front of the other. But Aliyah’s really strong-minded. Aliyah has an incredible will and perseverance that nothing’s gonna stop her.”
Mikiah Herbert Harrigan proves her growth
For senior forward Mikiah Herbert Harrigan, the questions were always as much about the mental side of her game as the physical. Foul calls she didn’t like, opponents’ trash talk and off shooting nights could and did derail her composure or confidence at various times through her first three seasons.
All throughout the offseason, Staley said over and over that Herbert Harrigan had matured and was ready to lead the Gamecocks. The Paradise Jam provided the first big test in that regard.
“Kiki, ever since we played Clemson, she was in a mode of shouldering this basketball team, not wanting us to lose a basketball game,” Staley told reporters. “And even when we lost, usually Kiki blows up and she just thinks that the world has ended. This time she kept her head up, and she just led our young team. She just said follow my lead, she set a great example. That’s how you need to respond after a loss.”
The loss to Indiana had all the elements to frustrate her — plenty of foul calls USC didn’t like, a fourth-quarter meltdown and an emotional defeat in returning to the Caribbean, where she was born. But after leading the Gamecocks with 13 points against the Hoosiers, Herbert Harrigan went on to score 33 points and grab 12 rebounds over the next two games. In the final surge to put No. 2 Baylor away, she had four points, a rebound, an assist and a block.
This story was originally published December 3, 2019 at 12:57 PM with the headline "Three takeaways from Dawn Staley on South Carolina’s whirlwind Thanksgiving weekend."
