Five top moments of Frank Martin Era

Frank Martin’s time in South Carolina has reached its unsatisfactory end.

Martin was brought in to turn around a struggling program in 2012 following Darrin Horn’s dismal four-year term. Save for one Final Four run, however, Martin was never able to truly get the Gamecocks program off the ground and take it to the heights that seemed possible following the 2017 season.

After 10 seasons, Martin was fired on Monday, exiting as the third-longest tenured head coach in program history, amassing a 171-157 record and just one NCAA Tournament appearance.

The Gamecocks have already started their search for a new head coach, and Gamecock Scoop gave a rundown of some top candidates to track early in the process.

In the meantime, we are taking a look back at a handful of the top moments for South Carolina during the Martin Era. Despite all the inconsistencies, average-or-worse finishes and the controversies with player suspensions and the mess of last year’s pandemic season, there are still some highlights to take away.

Impossible to start anywhere else.

The best postseason run in program history started in Greenville with wins over No. 10 Marquette and an incredible upset over No. 2 Duke before victories over No. 3 Baylor in the Sweet 16 and No. 4 Florida in the Elite Eight.

In the same year that he won SEC Player of the Year, Gamecocks star Sindarius Thornwell took the college basketball world by storm, averaging 25.8 points in those four games to earn the East Region’s most outstanding player award.

Thornwell, PJ Dozier, Chris Silva and Duane Notice were at the core of a historic season that ended with a 26-11 mark, setting a program record for most wins in a season before a close loss to Gonzaga in the Final Four.

Maybe it’s cheating to reserve two spots on this list for the same incredible run in 2017, but the Gamecocks’ upset over Duke is worthy of a standalone mention.

Taking down a Blue Devils squad led by five future first-round NBA Draft picks – including star Jayson Tatum and Grayson Allen, the consensus most hated player in recent college basketball history – ranks as the best win of the Martin Era.

To win that game in Greenville and take the building over from Duke fans adds to the sweetness for South Carolina fans who will remember that win and that March Madness run forever.

The entire vision for hiring Martin was to turn the program around 180 degrees and build something special.

That got off to an optimistic start when Thornwell committed about a month prior to the start of Martin’s first season in 2012. Thornwell, No. 43 overall in the 2013 class, was the highest-ranked recruit in South Carolina history up to that point, and the Oak Hill grad stuck by his commitment despite seeing the Gamecocks finish 14-18.

Thornwell’s historic commitment was surpassed by Dozier nearly two years later. The country’s 37th-ranked overall player in 2015 class, Dozier stayed home by committing to the Gamecocks out of Spring Valley High School just about two years after Thornwell made his pledge.

Landing those two began some major upward momentum, excitement and belief that Martin was doing what he set out to do – even though that belief never truly manifested itself into long-term success.

Thornwell and Dozier provided the two-man core for the most success the program had since winning the program’s lone SEC championship in 1996-97.

That included the aforementioned Final Four berth and also tying the school record for wins in the previous year with a 25-9 record, one win in the NIT – the program’s first postseason win since capturing back-to-back NIT titles in 2005 and 2006 – and the team’s first ranking in the AP poll in more than a decade.

Prior to Martin’s arrival in Columbia, the Gamecocks had finished above .500 just eight times in the 31 years since entering the SEC in 1991. Martin led South Carolina to a winning record in six of his 10 seasons.

The Gamecocks also had not won an NCAA Tournament game since 1973 when Frank McGuire was patrolling the sidelines for a Sweet 16 run back when the tournament featured only 25 teams. The 2017 Final Four run put an end to the tournament drought.