The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, January 22, 2003, Page 12, Image 12
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12 THE GAMECOCK ♦ Wednesday, January 22, 2003 GAME S (' H E 13EEE
'V f “■ \ r I 1 / >NJ MEN’S BASKETBALL at Mississippi State, 8 p.m. Wednesday
nnuTmirtmTio I If I I Fill W. « WOMEN’S BASKETBALL at Tennessee, 7 p.m. Thursday
CONTACT US L-F| I I—^ ' | ' MEN’S TENNIS at USC Winter Invitational,
I I ■ I \ I l in Columbia, Friday-Sunday
Story ideas? Questions? Comments? ■ \ /|| Ik/ MEN’S AND WOMEN’S TRACK at SEC Quad Meet,
E-mailusatgamecocksports@hotmail.com _ m r\^/ in Lexington, Ky., Saturday
Florida survives USC scare
f
PHOTO BY JOHNNY HAYNES/THE GAMECOCK
Gamecock forward Kerbrell Brown, center, drives through
Florida's Bonell Colas, left, and Anthony Roberson. Brown
finished with 22 points and four rebounds in the USC loss.
Gators’Bonner dunks home the go-ahead basket,
Powell’s desperation 3-pointer falls short at buzzer
BY SHAWN ROURK
THE GAMECOCK
Add season highs in team
shooting, season lows in
turnovers, domination in the
paint and a 12-0 fast-break point
lead, and the sum should equal a
victory in the team’s home court.
Add having to play Florida (15-2,
3-0 SEC) into the equation, how
ever, and it adds up to a 77-75 loss
for USC.
“It’s almost unfair what
Florida asks you to do. They ask
you to take a 6-foot 9-inch guy and
guard him at 25 feet,” USC head
coach Dave Odom said. “You’ve
got to drive them in the ground
and finish them, because they are
not going to finish themselves.
But it’s a night we can build on.”
The Gamecocks (7-7,1-3) kept
up with the sixth-ranked team in
the nation for the entire game;
however, the Gators fought
through the inside for a late dunk
with 33 seconds left in the game.
Florida would go on to make
three more free throws to put
USC away.
Florida stayed close for most
of the game until its team took
the lead back off a 3-pointer from
freshman Anthony Roberson to •
put Florida ahead 68-67.
Carolina hung close, but let
Florida senior Matt Bonner work
his way inside for a dunk with 33
seconds left in the game, pushing
Florida up by two. As the last
four seconds ran off the clock,
Carlos Powell lost control of the
ball going down the court and put
a desperate shot up, but it sailed
high as time ran out.
“We know we lost to a great
team, an excellent coach — I
think the best skilled team in our
league,” Odom said. “And while
I’m not into moral victories or
anything like that, I think if we
can have more performances on
a consistent basis like we had
tonight, I think our team will
grow.”
Before the game, Odom said
his team would have to work the
inside if it was going to be suc
cessful.
Enter Tony Kitchings.
The 6-foot 10-inch senior had a
career game offensively. In the
first seven minutes of the game,
he had already surpassed his sea
son-high scoring totals. For the
first three minutes of the game,
Kitchings was the only Gamecock
to score. Kitchings finished with
22 points on the night. However,
Florida came out in the second
half and held the big man at bay,
allowing him only two points.
“I thought Florida made a real
concerted effort to be more phys
ical inside in the second half,”
Odom said.
Freshman Kerbrell Brown
came off the bench to tie Kitchings
with 22 points in the game, along
with four rebounds, and went 4-7
at the three-point line.
Florida shot only 37 percent in
the first half, most of it from the
outside. Carolina’s zone defense
pushed most of Florida’s long
range shooters into their comfort
zones. Florida made 18 of its 35
attempts from behind the arc
compared with USC’s seven.
“It’s a pick-your-poison deal
with Florida,” Odom said. “You
guard them on the perimeter,
they open inside. It’s a great
move.”
The problems continued for
USC, which was not able to stop
Florida’s second-chance shots
early on and gave up 20 points on
second-chance opportunities.
“In the first half, we said that
one of the things we wanted to do
was eliminate second shots be
cause second shots lead to a 3
point attempt,” Odom said. “I
think if you go back and look at
the play-by-play, you’ll find that
they had three offensive re
bounds in the first 10 minutes,
and two of them ended with 3
point attempts that went in.
That’s a key point.”
Florida freshman Matt Walsh
also had a big game, scoring 17
on the night, as he hit a few key
free throws down the stretch and
had his biggest assist on the
Bonner dunk that put Florida
ahead for good.
Carolina will look to capital
ize on its performance against
Florida to prepare for the rest of
the upcoming SEC games.
“This loss is a hard loss, but it’s
a night we can build on. I can go
back and coach on this,” Odom
said. “We need to work on condi
tioning; some of our guys are get
ting tired to easily. We need to
work on our offensive execution.”
“We played hard,” senior
guard Chuck Eidson said. “But
there’s still some lapses that we
had. We can still improve a lot.” .
The improvement will need to
come quickly, though; the
Gamecocks face Mississippi
State in Starkville, Miss., tonight.
—
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USC mistakes prove costly
BY NICK YOUNG
THE8AMECOCK
The Carolina women’s basket
ball team failed to keep its home
record perfect Sunday against the
Georgia Bulldogs (12-4, 3-0 SEC),
when it lost by a margin of 67-59.
In the first half, it looked as if the
Gamecocks (14-3,2-2) would have
absolutely no chance in the contest;
they shot a mere 29 percent and
committed 14 turnovers in an
abysmal first-half performance.
The Bulldogs held Jocelyn
Penn, the nation’s leading scorer,
to two first-half points, slowing
down Carolina’s fast-break of
fense.
Penn added to the Gamecocks’
troubles with two early fouls and
had trouble adjusting to the style
of play.
“In the first half, I was in foul
trouble, and I guess I wasn’t fo
cused on the game, but on trying
not to foul,” she said. “In the sec
ond half, I just wanted to go out
there and do all the little things to
keep my team going.”
The loss was the team’s second
in its past three games.
“I’m not pleased with our over
all performance; I’m not pleased
with how we started the game,”
Carolina head coach Susan
Walvius said. “I thought we were
careless with the basketball, and
we’ve got to do a better job taking
care of the basketball. I thought it
came down to the last three min
utes in each half.”
As bad as things were going in
the first half, USC had the score
tied at 19-19 with a few minutes re
maining in the period. But UGA
went on a 13-0 run to end the first
half with the score of 32-19 in its
favor.
The Gamecocks and the
Bulldogs switched roles as the sec
ond half began, and USC went on
an incredible 11-3 run to start the
period. As the score got closer and
closer, Georgia players Christi
Thomas and Alexis Kendrick took
the game over.
After Carolina senior Penn gave
the Gamecocks a 48-47 lead, their
first lead since 4-2, Thomas scored
nine Consecutive points to give the
Bulldogs a 56-52 lead with just un
der four minutes left in the game.
After a few points by each team,
Penn hit a line-drive 3-pointer that
brought USC within one with only
48 seconds left to play. After a
timeout, Kendrick put a dagger in
Carolina’s hopes with a big 3
pointer.
“It was clutch. Not only that,
but they had (Georgia guard Mary
Beth) Lycett wide open in the cor
ner,” Walvius said. “That was an
indication, to me, of a lack of com
munication defensively. I think
our team was disappointed in how
this one turned out.”
After another timeout, Kendrick
scored two free throws and sealed
the UGA win.
“I’m disappointed because I
thought it was a winnable game,”
Walvius said. “It’s frustrating to
be at home and have the opportu
nity to win a basketball game and
not be able to finish it.”
USC will travel to Tennessee to
play the fifth-ranked Volunteers
Thursday. This game will be
Carolina’s fifth consecutive
against a ranked SEC team.
“Our first five (SEC) games are
unbelievable, and now we have to
go to Tennessee to play,” Walvius
said. “Tennessee’s a great team.
They are extremely good at home.
We’re going to have to play really
well to win the game.”
The Lady Volunteers (11-3,3-0)
come into the game on a high note
after their coach, Pat Summitt, be
came the first women’s basketball
coach in history to reach 800 ca
reer victories.
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rnui U dY JUniNiNt n« » iuo/ i nc taAivitOUUK
USC point guard Cristina Ciocan calls a play on offense. The
Gamecocks suffered their first loss at home Sunday.
Brown, Kitchings star in Carolina loss
BY MATT ROTHENBERG
THE GAMECOCK
Though the Gamecocks added
a game to their loss column in the
standings, there are few negatives
one can really take out of their
game Saturday night against the
sixth-ranked Florida Gators at
the Carolina Center. Two pf the
major positives from that game
were the performances of two of
USC’s post players.
Center Tony Kitchings and
forward Kerbrell Brown played
the role of spark plugs on a
Carolina team that found little
other sources of offense.
Kitchings helped the Gamecocks
come rushing out of the gates at
the beginning. He scored eight
of his 19 first-half points to help
USC bolt ahead of the Gators,
and Kitchings’ defensive play
kept Florida’s big men con
tained.
“We had a good
a tonight; we had a
USC head coach
Dave Odom said.
our post guys
Kitchings tonight — Tony
(Kitchings) and
Ro Howell — stood tall against
some of the best big guys in our
league.”
Brown, with 22 points and four
rebounds in the game, has been
providing sound relief, often as
the first person off USC’s bench.
On a night when Chuck Eidson
and Carlos Powell couldn’t buy a
3-pointer, Brown led the
Gamecocks in 3-point field goals,
making four of seven.
However, as the slugfest be
tween the Gators and
Gamecocks continued, it ap
peared that Kitchings was be
ginning to slow down and suc
cumb to foul trouble. In the sec
ond half, Florida tightened up on
its play inside, giving its for
wards the go-ahead to prevent
Kitchings from getting open, re
sulting in the Carolina center’s
getting only one shot.
Odom thought the Aiken na
tive was getting worn out as time
went on, though Kitchings denied
it.
“I’m sure he got tired. I thought
Florida made a real concerted ef
fort to be more physical inside in
the second half,” Odom said. “I
thought they felt they were too
soft early.”
“Tony had a hard time getting
shots off, and he was probably get
ting fatigued a little bit,” Odom
said.
Kitchings added: “I could have
kept scoring, but Kerbrell was
stroking them. And when you got
a guy shooting like that, you’ve
got to get (the ball) to him. I mean,
threes count more than twos, so
when I see him hitting, I’ll just
pass it along.”
Brown began to appear to be
getting tired; he played 18 min
utes in the second half. In fact, he
scored more of his points in the
second than in the first.
“I think he’s another one that
tired,” Odom said.
“He played 30 min
utes tonight, I
would bet that’s
the most that he’s
played.”
The key mo
ment for Brown,
Brown however, was
with 47 seconds re
maining in the
game. With the score tied at 72,
Brown missed a point-blank tip
in. Matt Walsh got the rebound
♦ BASKETBALL, SEE PAGE 13
Students
show no
respect to
Gators
MATTROTHENBERG
GAMECOCKSPORTS@HOTMAIL.COM
There are some chants
that just don’t belong.
Most of you should be ashamed
of yourselves.
Some of you who were in the
student section at the men’s bas
ketball game Saturday night made
me embarrassed to be one of your
peers.
Maybe you don’t know what
I’m talking about. I think the
phrases “Matt Boner” and “Walsh
is gay” might ring a bell.
Is this what we’ve come to?
I know USC fans rival some of
the nation’s best, but when I hear
heckling like that from my fellow
students, why is it that I feel
you’re bringing us down a notch
or two?
Now, I ve been here tor almost
four years. I’ve been to many foot
ball and basketball games and
have heard numerous chants and
derisive comments aimed at ref
erees, umpires, opposing coaches
and opposing players.
But Saturday night, you guys
took the cake.
In my opinion, some of the stu
dents were just as bad as the
Philadelphia Eagles fans are at
home games, or even Yankees fans
sitting in the bleachers at Yankee
Stadium.
You see, the art of heckling has
within it a fine line — one that,
when crossed, makes you sound
like you’re in an elementary
school playground. I think most of
us here can be considered grown
ups. Let’s act like it a little more
often.
On one side, I think there’s a
good type of heckling.
It’s OK to boo at a call you don’t
like; for that matter, even chant
ing “bullshit” toward the referees
falls within those boundaries.
Also, the usual “good riddance”
farewell we give to basketball play
ers who pick up their fifth foul
would most certainly qualify as a
good heckling. I’m sure there are
more examples you can come up
with on your own.
I’m well aware that sometimes,
the fans — usually students — will
go ahead and pick someone to ride
all night long. I guess Walsh was
that guy on Saturday.
in oi omy Qia you people cross
the fine line, you obliterated it.
Does it make you feel good to in
sult someone by questioning his
sexuality? What if someone ques
tioned yours?
But when Walsh hit those two
3-pointers, I know that shut up
most of you quite a bit.
Then there’s “Matt Boner.”
Gee, like we hadn’t already heard
that last year when Florida was in
town? It seemed to get old fast this
time around, and then he goes
ahead and scores the game-win
ning basket.
I guess that just goes to show
that good players can keep then
heads despite all the bashing that
goes on around them. H$ck, some
of them can use those chants as a
way to elevate their games. They
did Saturday night, and what do
you have to say about it now?
I’m sure it embarrasses some
of the student-athletes’ family
and friends, who might be in at
tendance that night. Would you
want your son singled out and
called a homosexual? I seriously
doubt it.
Words like those don’t exactly
give some people a good impres
sion of our university. With some
students, I guess the Carolinian
Creed is forgotten when they en
ter the Carolina Center. We can be
fans who heckle tastefully and not
use words that are, at the least, im
proper. Even though it might go
on at many other schools, there’s
no reason why we need to do it at
Carolina.
USC men’s basketball head
j
♦ ROTHENBERG, SEE PAGE 13