S.C. uses Indiana's remarks as 'extra motivation'

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- South Carolina may have trailed Indiana at halftime on Saturday, but that deficit was not the only motivation that fueled the Gamecocks in the second half.

Following a 64-53 win that advanced them to their 11th straight Sweet 16, players said they viewed comments Indiana players made the previous day as bulletin board material.

"That put the fire to us," guard Raven Johnson said.

Indiana lost to South Carolina in the Sweet 16 last year, 79-74. The key difference, guard Sydney Parrish noted during a pregame press conference Saturday, was South Carolina not having Kamilla Cardoso (graduation) and Ashlyn Watkins (injury) this year.

Parrish said, in part: "Without a 6-7 kid in there with Kamilla and Ashlyn Watkins being injured at the beginning of this year, that definitely helps us."

South Carolina guard Bree Hall said she went to sleep re-reading the comments. On the defensive end, she held Indiana's leading scorer, Yarden Garzon, to 10 points on 4-of-13 shooting. Parrish, meanwhile, totaled six points on 2-of-7 shooting.

Hall came through on the offensive end, too, leading the team with 11 points and helping key the third-quarter surge. Her 3-pointer allowed South Carolina to turn a one-point halftime deficit into a 45-33 lead as South Carolina opened the quarter hitting nine of its first 10 shots.

South Carolina ended up scoring 26 third-quarter points and shooting 69 percent from the field. The Gamecocks had 25 total first-half points in what amounted to a complete offensive turnaround.

"I went to bed and read that article again and was like, 'Oh, this is how you feel about us," Hall said of the Indiana comments. "For people like me and Raven, we need that extra motivation. We go into the game, and we always are already thinking about defense, but now you've given us a reason to be motivated."

South Carolina has made headlines for its stellar bench play this season. Its top two scorers - Joyce Edwards and MiLaysia Fulwiley - come off the bench. But both were held well below their season averages.

That gave the starters an opportunity to step up. In addition to Hall, Sania Feagin had 10 points and Chloe Kitts had a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds. All 10 of her points came in the second half.

"We have to lean on our most experienced players," South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said. "They've been here before. They've done it time and time again, through being on the court or just seeing it from sitting on the bench. That is experience, being in these situations."

Johnson specifically pointed to the way Feagin stepped up on the interior as she brought up the comments from Saturday. In addition to Parrish, forward Karoline Striplin said, "I wouldn't say [it's] easier to guard their post players at all this year, but the height advantage definitely gives us a little bit more room to run some of our stuff that we normally do."

"People say we don't have these dominant bigs," Johnson said. "I know you saw what (was) said, that we weren't going to win without Ashlyn or Kamilla. We don't need Ashlyn or Kamilla to win. We've got a whole team of dogs to win. I can name the whole roster. We've got dogs on this team."

Fulwiley, who ended up with three points in just 10 minutes, said the entire team did not take the comments lightly.

"I didn't like it," Fulwiley said. "We didn't like it as a team, but it's a competitive month. Everybody wants to win, but also I feel like you can want to win without saying certain things. Certain lines you should leave up to fans to say.

"Saying things like that is not smart for your team. So next week, whoever we're playing, don't doubt us out loud. That motivates us to want to play better. You're showing your hand. They showed us that they think they can beat us. That motivated us to want to go out there and play even harder and beat them by more than two points."