University of South Carolina Libraries
- - IIII^ IILWWII1. JI . • jiUMlip. |J I| III .P*,»,. * < \\ 10 Game.Schedyie' WOMEN’S BASKETBALL at Florida, 7 p.m. Thursday MEN’S BASKETBALL vs. LSU, 7:30 p.m. Saturday Pnntart l Id * WOMEN’S SWIMMING vs. Miami, 11 a.m. Saturday L»UI ILdcl. MEN’S AND WOMEN’S TRACK at SEC Invitational in Story ideas? Questions? Comments? Gainesville, Fla., Sunday E-mail us at gamecocksports(agwm.sc.edu USC destroys division rival UT in 21-point rout BY JONATHAN HILLYARD THE GAMECOCK The USC men’s basketball team (16-2,3-1 SEC) continued its early success in SEC play by demolish ing division rival Tennessee 85-64 at the Colonial Center Saturday night. The win tied the largest margin of victory over an SEC op ponent at home since 2000. “I really believe that those that have seen us play are more im pressed with how we play than the number of wins," USC head coach Dave Odom said following the vic tory. Regardless of Odom’s state ment, Carolina continues its best start in over 30 years. Saturday’s win, in fact, was Odom’s 50th win at USC (50-33), making him the sec ond fastest coach in Carolina his tory to reach the 50-win plateau, behind only Frank Johnson. The highlight of the win was the offensive effort by the Gamecocks. Carolina would fin ish the game with an unselfish 25 assists and a low turnover count of 11. In addition to its & points, the second-highest points total of the season, USC shot an outra geous 64.7 percent from beyond the three-point line, coupled with a field goal percentage of 63.6, the school’s best under coach Odom. • “When we have it going, we re ally have it going,” said senior point guard Mike Boynton. “Tennessee just caught us when we were clicking on all cylinders. ” Boynton, who celebrated his 22nd birthday by putting a hurt on the Vols, had a solid performance with 13 points, seven assists and six rebounds. Sophomore guard Tarence Kinsey, despite not start ing after being late to a pre-game meal, and junior forward Carlos Powell also had solid games with 13 points and 12 points respectively. * However, the star of the game was withoqt a doubt junior guard Josh Gonner. Gonner scored 19 points in the second half and end ed the game with a career-high 24 points. He finished a spectacular 10-of-13 from the field, including 3-of-4 from behind the arc. me game was rougn ior me vis iting Volunteers right from the get-go, as USC opened the game on a 21-3 run that had the Colonial Center shaking. The run saw the Gamecocks shoot an unconscious 9-of-12 from the field, coupled with Tennessee committing six turnovers and shooting a crip pling l-of-5 from the field. While UT did experience a hot streak, the first half was basically all Gamecocks. In addition to Boynton’s 11 points and Powell’s nine, USC scored 16 points off 10 Volunteer turnovers to take a 40 27 lead into halftime. The second half was the same story for Carolina. If any momen tum had been taken away from ♦ MEN, SEE PAGE 11 ■ wm _—i PHOTO BY MARK SCHILLING/THE GAMECOCK Forward Renaldo Balkman slams the ball in (JSC’s blowout of Tennessee on Saturday. Balkman had six points on the night. Victory over Vols illustrates success of Carolina offense BY BRAD SENKIW THE GAMECOCK While the USC men’s basketball team has proved to be one of the best teams defensively in the SEC, Carolina mirrored an offensive powerhouse on Saturday against Tennessee. The 85-64 win capped the largest SEC victory for Carolina since equaling a 21-point win over Alabama in 2000. The Gamecocks looked as if they were shooting into Lake Murray after connecting on 11 of their 17 attempts from behind the three-point line for a 64.7 percent age. Carolina also had success in side the arc with a 63.6 percent overall shooting percentage. It was the best shooting night that the Gamecocks have experi enced in head coach Dave Odom’s career at USC. “I thought we were much more aggressive off the dribble and the pass,” Odom said. “I thought the unselfishness of our team today was extraordinary. I was amazed at it.” After a dismal shooting night against Auburn last Wednesday, in which the Gamecocks shot 15 percent from behind the arc, se nior point guard Mike Boynton contributed Saturday’s hot shoot ing to Thursday’s practice when the coaching staff employed an all offensive workout. “They wanted to fine-tune some things, work on screening, work on our footwork and work on our passing and catching,” Boynton said. “That kind of helped us to day.” Tennessee began the game in a zone defense, something Odom ex-, pected to see after the Gamecocks’* recent offensive struggles. Boynton said the key to break ing UT’s zone was to force the ball in the middle of the floor, opening up looks for the outside shooters. But this time, Carolina drilled the shots given to them. “Every zone is a little bit differ ent, but at the same time we know our offense is going to work,” Boynton said. “We believe in the system that coach has instilled in us, and we just executed it.” Junior guard Josh Gonner took advantage of the strategy by nail ing 10 of his 13 shots from the field, including a 3-for-4 performance from behind the three-point line. Gonner reached a career-high with his 24 points, 10 shots made and a 76.9 shooting percentage. | “I had a lot of open looks, most of them with the shot clock running down, but they were still open looks,” Gonner said. “I got the op portunity to set my feet, get my shot going, and I was knocking it down.” Now USC looks to build upon their latest offensive success, just as they’ve done on the defensive end. And the confidence exhibit ed against Tennessee is what the players believe in. “We’ve got a team full of people that can shoot the ball, that can score the ball,” Gonner said. “We just go out and play ball. Some days they fall, and some days they don’t.” Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@gwm.sc.edu ^ PHOTO BY MARK SCHILLING/THE GAMECOCK Guard Kelly Morrone plays defense. Morrone scored a team-high 15 points in a loss to Arkansas. BY JIM ROCHE THB (IAMECOCK The USC women’s basketball team lost its sixth game in a row against the Arkansas Lady Razorbacks by 66-52 in front of 1,593 people at the Colonial Center Sunday afternoon. Arkansas standout forward Shameka Christon had 31 points to lead the Lady Razorbacks to the win, while USC’s guard Kelly Morrone had 15 points in the loss. The Gamecocks shot just 23 per cent in the first half and could nev er really close the gap against the Lady Razorbacks (13-3, 2-1 SEC), as USC dropped to 0-3 in confer ence play and 8-7 overall. The first half started out slow for both teams. South Carolina only scored 8 points in the first 12 minutes of the game. USC con verted 5-of-8 free throws and shot 62.5 percent behind the line in the first half, but the Lady Razorbacks capitalized on USC turnovers, outscoring the Gamecocks 15-2 on points off turnovers. Despite the scoring drought, USC only trailed by 10 at halftime 28-18. The second half was the com plete opposite of the first, as both teams mounted strong offensive attacks. USC closed the gap to sev en when guard Lauren Simms stole the ball and went the other way for a break-away lay-up ear-, ly in the half. Christon countered by hitting key shots for Arkansas down the stretch. USC went inside to forward Iva Sliskovic several times and found success, but Christon and post Katrina NeSby were too strong for USC to catch up. “Confidence is a powerful thing in this game, and we are not play ing with confidence right now,” said USC head coach Susan Walvius. The Gamecocks will look to get back on track this Thursday as they travel to Gainesville, Fla. to play the Florida Gators. “I think it will take a lot of de termination, and we have to refuse to lose to get over this los ing streak,” said Simms. The Gators are coming off a win (83-73) over No. 11 Georgia. Florida is 2-2 in SEC play and 12-5 overall. The Gators have several key players including senior All American center Vanessa “We need our leadership to step up.” SUSAN WALVIUS use HEAD COACH Hayden who leads the SEC in re bounding and forward Tashia Morehead who scored 22 points and recorded 12 rebounds in Florida’s last game against Georgia. Florida comes to the game leading the SEC in blocked shots, averaging seven blocked shots a game. USC will need a strong scoring effort from senior guards Morrone and Cristina Ciocan, and a strong attack down low by Sliskovic to keep Hayden off the boards. “We need our leadership to step up,” said Walvius. Perhaps a match up against the Gators is what the Gamecocks need to get back on track and raise their con fidence level after this hard six game losing streak. Carolina will tip-off against Florida Thursday at 7 p.m. at the Stephen C. O’Connell Center in Gainesville, Fla. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@gwm.sc.edu We need a good Super Bowl, not hype or smack-talking The face of the NFL is one of flashy, arrogant personalities who seem to practice their touch down dances more than their passing routes. Athletes such as Terrell Owens with his infamous Sharpie inci dent, and, most recently, Joe Horn and his SHAWN $30,000 cell ROURK phone call Second-year made earlier print this season, left journalism a few black student marks on the face of the NFL. So isn’t it a little ironic that the two teams in this year’s Super Bowl are two of the most no-nonsense teams the NFL has, not to mention some of the more humble players and coaches you can find in any professional sport? People like Jake Delhomme, who would rather put the glory Qn his receivers and running backs than take any for himself, and New England head coach Bill Belichick, who is one of the most low-key and laid-back coaches in the league, are show ing that running your mouth is not a prerequisite for being suc cessful in the NFL. Heck, even the infamous Rod “He Hate Me” Smart, leftover from the now-de funct XFL, is keeping his mouth shut and letting his running do the talking. The players in the upcoming Super Bowl don’t talk much. They only talk enough to get past the hundreds of press conferences they will be put through. The oth er irony is that there are two weeks in between the conference championships and the Super Bowl this year, plenty of room for hype —-exactly what both teams do not use or have a lot of. Some people have called these teams boring. I say, so what? With all the flair and spectacle that is the pre-game show of the Super Bowl; with the billions of dollars that will be spent on com mercials; with the very groovy Janet Jackson performing at the halftime show, why must both teams be made up of flashy char acters and superstar personali ties? Why can’t we have a close, exciting football game? I like the fact that neither team is very polished on both sides of the ball. I like that both teams like to hit hard and are not afraid to run the ball up the mid die. That’s what the Super Bowl is about: the best football of the year. Most of the “experts” around football believe this is go ing to be a close game, made up of two defensively driven teams. Last season’s Super Bowl left a lot to be desired in Tampa Bay’s blowout of Oakland, which I am . still a little sore about. I person- 0 ally am ready for a little excite ment surrounding the actual football game in the Super Bowl instead of having the announc ers rehash the past 19 weeks of football over the last four min utes of the game because the score is 45-10. Four of the past five Super Bowls have been de cided by double-digit point deficits; that doesn’t make for good TV, so it’s no wonder peo ple say fewer and fewer people • are watching the Super Bowl. My idea of a good Super Bowl is one that comes down to fourth and long with under 30 seconds left in the game and the Hail Mary to win it all — cue the NFL^ Films music. Now that is excite-^ ment, and then maybe when Delhomme goes down in the his tory books for throwing the said pass to win the game, maybe, just maybe, he’ll take credit for doing something great on this team. SEC.News.and.Notes Georgia’s Wright gets weekly honor Georgia's senior guard Rashad Wright has been named the SEC player of the week for last week. Wright led the Bulldogs (9-5,1-2 SEC) to a huge 65-57 road win over then fifth ranked Kentucky in Kentucky’s first loss in 22 games. Wright scored 20 points in the contest and shot an amaz ing 80 percent from behind the three-point line. The 20 points marked an SEC career-high for Wright. He played all but one minute in the game and held Kentucky coun terpart Cliff Hawkins to one point. Wright's playing time av erage of 36.4 minutes leads the SEC, and he needs 18 assists to become Georgia's all-time as sist leader. Wright is averaging 14.6 points per game along with three rebounds and three as sists. This is the first time he has had the honor, but he is the second Georgia Bulldog to be named player of the week this season. Jonas Hayes was hon ored Jan. 5. Full game schedule set for this week Week two of SEC play brought many surprises throughout the southeast. With Kentucky and Florida's upsets at the hands of Georgia and Vanderbilt, no team in the SEC has a perfect conference mark. The conference madness will continue this week with a full schedule of games1. On Wednesday Alabama will trav el to Georgia to take on the Bulldogs; Arkansas will go to Auburn for an early division showdown; 17th-ranked Florida will host 20th-ranked Mississippi State at 8 p.m. on JP Sports; and Ole Miss will de fend its home court against the LSU Tigers. On Saturday, in a match-up between Bulldogs, Georgia will0 travel to Starkville to take on Mississippi State at 1 p.m. on JP Sports; Arkansas plays host to Vanderbilt at 3;05 p.m. on JP Sports; Auburn travels to Florida at 4 p.m. on CBS; Ole Miss plays host to Alabama at 6 p.m. on Fox Sports Net; and USC will play host to LSU. Sunday features marquee match-ups with Kentucky traveling to Notre Dame at 4 p.m. on CBS and Tennessee playing host to Louisville at 7 p.m. on ESPN.