No. 5 Alabama will look to build on a positive debut in Southeastern Conference play when it takes on South Carolina on Wednesday at Columbia, S.C.
The Crimson Tide (12-2, 1-0 SEC) couldn’t have played much better than they did during a 107-79 rout of then-No. 12 Oklahoma on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the Gamecocks (10-4, 0-1) would like to put their own conference opener behind them after a dismal performance Saturday. They were crushed 85-50 by then-No. 17 Mississippi State.
Alabama has won nine consecutive games against South Carolina.
Alabama’s victory on Saturday was its fourth this season over a ranked opponent. The Crimson Tide’s prior three such wins came in non-conference play against Illinois, Houston and North Carolina.
“That non-conference schedule really showed us our weaknesses, and we were able to capitalize in practice,” Alabama guard Mark Sears said after Saturday’s win.
Sears continues to be the catalyst for a Crimson Tide squad that enters Wednesday’s contest on a six-game winning streak. Sears, who totaled 22 points and 10 assists against the Sooners, is averaging team bests of 18.3 points and 4.4 assists per game this season.
Alabama scored 100 or more points in a game for the 14th time in the past two seasons, which is the most in the nation during that span. The Crimson Tide enter the week leading the country in average scoring (91.1 points per game) but have allowed 77.4 points, which ranks 313th.
“We’re capable of being a great defensive team,” Alabama coach Nate Oats said after the Oklahoma game. “I still think there’s a lot of chemistry to be figured out.”
South Carolina had a seven-game winning streak snapped against Mississippi State, and the Gamecocks’ scoring output was a season low and was 16 points less than their previous low after they shot just 29.1 percent from the field and went only 2-for-19 from 3-point range.
But what concerned South Carolina coach Lamont Paris more was the apparent lack of fight from his team early.
The Gamecocks were held to 10 points over the first 14-plus minutes of the game and trailed by 30 four minutes into the second half.
“We’ll show a lot of the stuff on the film when we see it, just situations where it’s you versus that guy,” Paris said after the loss. “Ability kind of, sort of matters, but who you are as a competitor really matters in that one particular moment. And how many ever those that were in the game, we got the short end of the stick in those situations. So that was surprising.”
Zachary Davis scored 22 points against the Bulldogs, but the Gamecocks’ leading scorer this season, Collin Murray-Boyles (15.8 points per game), will try to bounce back after being held to five points.
Murray-Boyles has been a force on the glass as well for South Carolina, averaging 9.4 rebounds per game. He figures to battle Alabama’s Grant Nelson (8.8) in the paint.
“We got 17 more games, and it’s going to be a lot of similar games to that,” South Carolina forward Nick Pringle said. “So we’ve got to step up our game a lot to be able to handle the rest of the games coming our way.”
–Field Level Media
