What Dawn Staley said after South Carolina’s close road SEC win over Florida
Dawn Staley and the No. 3 Gamecocks got a gutsy win Sunday .
Despite poor shooting and turnover problems, South Carolina was able beat Florida 74-63. The Gamecocks are 15-1 on the year and 2-0 in conference play.
Here are the highlights of Staley’s postgame comments.
Surviving an SEC test
South Carolina started its SEC slate with a big 26-point win over Alabama earlier this week.
But even though that blowout win was one of several for South Carolina already this season (the Gamecocks have an 38.9 point average scoring margin), Staley said the Florida game was proof it won’t all be easy sailing in conference play.
“They’re all going to be like this,” Staley said. “They’re not going to be like you’re just gonna walk through and win games by 30 points. That is not how it’s going to be in our league. We knew it was going to be a tough game. Last time we were here, we were down big, it might have been double digits…so we reminded our players of that.”
“So we keep that in the back of our minds and just, in real time, got to figure out how to win. You gotta make adjustments, you got to make sure your players are confident enough to turn the page and get to the next thing so it doesn’t impact what’s happening in real time.”
Bad night for ball security
The Gamecocks posted a season-worst for turnovers against Florida. South Carolina turned the ball over 21 times.
The last time South Carolina turned the ball over more than 20 times came last season in a win against Texas at home.
“We got sped up. It was that kind of game. Sometimes, when it’s that kind of game, you just gotta go. You gotta find a way to win the game, no matter how ugly it looks. And then you win ugly, and you go home and you figure some things out, and hopefully you can correct some things, and hope that it doesn’t lead to another performance like this. But I like the win.”
Lucky for South Carolina, Florida turned the ball over 20 times .
A season-low in shooting
Before Sunday, the Gamecocks had yet to shoot less than 40% from the field as a team this season. Then South Carolina set a new season-low shooting percentage with a 34.3% mark against Florida.
The Gamecocks shot 33.3% in the first and second quarters, 27.8% in the third quarter and 43.8% in the fourth quarter. Oftentimes the looks were there for South Carolina, but the shots just wouldn’t fall.
Staley blamed some of the shooting woes on Florida’s defense rushed South Carolina’s offense.
“Florida sped us up,” Staley said. “They made us play faster than our skill set can handle. And then I think we just were rushed. There were some options out there, like multiple options, and you get confused on which one you really want to do. Do you want to shoot the ball, do you want to drive it, do you want to drive and kick it.”
“All those things probably are going through our players’ minds, because there were gaps in their defense. There were gaps in the defense because they were overplaying us and making us play faster. So we did not handle that part well. We got to get better with that. But I’d rather people play us faster than slower.”
Corralling Florida’s star and praise for a pair of point guards
Although star Florida guard Liv McGill finished with 18 points, South Carolina was able to limit her for a majority of the game.
McGill came into the matchup No. 3 in the country (and leading the SEC) with an average of 24.9 points per game. McGill had just nine points in the first half and entered the fourth quarter with 13.
Veteran Raven Johnosn and sophomore role player Maddy McDaniel were in charge of guarding McGill for a majority of the game. McDaniel finished with six points, five assists and two steals in a career-high 33 minutes of action. Johnson scored 17 points and had six rebounds.
“I thought they both did a really good job on McGill,” Staley said. “She’s a 30-point night player. She’s dynamic, spectacular, can carry a team. I thought we did a really good job crowding her space and not giving her easy pathways to the basket or easy pathways to playmake for her teammates.”
“Maddy, especially. We know Raven has the ability to do that, but Mouse hasn’t displayed that consistently in a game. She’s never played 33 minutes in a game, but she played 33 minutes because we felt like we couldn’t take off the floor because she was making that much of an impact.”
This story was originally published January 4, 2026 at 6:13 PM.
