PARIS — Ieasia Walker was not even surprised.

The former Gamecock and 2012-13 SEC Defensive Player of the Year joined Dawn Staley's program before her second season as South Carolina head coach, and has pretty much seen everything since.

When she heard her former head coach was off to Paris for the first college basketball game ever on French soil — tipping off Monday at 1 p.m. ET against Notre Dame — she had to laugh.

"I didn't get a chance to talk to Coach Staley about it," Walker told GamecockScoop. "I'm just so used to her doing things like this it's just like, 'ah, that's supposed to happen.'"

Right now, it feels like it is.

South Carolina has qualified for 11 consecutive NCAA Tournaments, a streak Walker helped start during her final two seasons in Columbia. During the time frame, the Gamecocks have reached five Final Fours, won two National Championships, and won a title of some kind — either conference regular season, conference tournament, or national — in nine of the last 10 seasons.

In an era where an experience as extravagant as Paris seems normal, it is easy to forget where the program arrived from. Walker is a link between the past and present, having started her career on a team that went 14-15 and ending it as part of just the program's third NCAA Tournament team in 21 seasons.

"There's a sense of pride in going to South Carolina," Walker said. "I'm always going to have pride in my school and being a part of the team there and being a part of the vision. I played my part when I was there. To see where it's grown and gone to, and the players that have come in and played their part, it's just so cool to see how this is growing every year."

Those initial years in Columbia, the vision was the only thing on the table.

The only way out was forward, one day at a time. One game, one practice, one recruiting visit, one fundraising meeting at a time. Every day was an opportunity to build the brand more, to bring something new to South Carolina.

Early architects of the program's golden era are long gone, more than a decade removed from putting on a jersey in some cases. But even though they are not the ones walking through The Louvre or going up the Eiffel Tower, they know opportunities like this are only possible for programs in rarified air.

And they vividly remember the painstaking work it took to catapult South Carolina into such air. As big as the dreams were and as high as the aspirations reached, nobody thought it would get anywhere near Paris.

"It's really surreal," 2010-12 guard Markeshia Grant told GamecockScoop. "You look back, what 12-13 seasons ago, and we are going to Paris to have a game. You just don't foresee that. But it just speaks to the foundation that my team built back in that 2012 season and then the likes of A'ja Wilson staying home and Tiffany Mitchell and Aleighsa Welch and all those players who have come along and built it to where it is today. I just think they're reaping the rewards of all the hard work of the people who have come before them."

Suggesting the notion almost seems ridiculous.

Even the idea South Carolina needs another recruiting tool or an extra advantage over the competition in talent acquisition flies in the face of logic.

Despite losing one of the most decorated recruiting classes in college athletics history after the 2022-23 season, the Gamecocks are loaded. The incoming freshman class included three of the top 40 prospects in the country as rated by ESPN, and two of the top-33 players for 2024 already verbally committed to South Carolina.

The pipeline is flowing, and it will continue.

But just by cracking the door to international basketball open, the future changes.

South Carolina Women's Basketball, which at this time last decade had never even played in a Final Four, belongs on the international stage. That alone is a window into limitless potential and an understanding of what playing in Paris could mean.

"This game of this magnitude, it creates more opportunities for all the players," 2008-12 South Carolina guard La'Keisha Sutton told GamecockScoop. "Definitely more NIL opportunities, more deals, more exposure. There's different career paths, right? They'll be remembered for the basketball game, but it's the relationships that they'll make and the people that will get to watch them that will be life-changing as well."

Those different career paths include international basketball. Staley herself played in France for two years after graduating from Virginia. Victaria Saxton, who finished her five-season term with the program last year, plays professionally in Belgium. Everywhere you look around Paris, from outside the Eiffel Tower to inside the arena itself, signs about next summer's Olympics in Paris remind you how big basketball is worldwide and what those opportunities are.

"This is definitely a selling point for recruiting," Grant said. "You get to play abroad. Maybe the four years you're here you might go to the Bahamas, you might go to Jamaica, you might go to the Virgin Islands, there's just so many things and so many places you're going to experience. Definitely a recruiting tool. I definitely think this will help."

In a vacuum, it is one game. South Carolina will play 28 more in the regular season, and it hopes nine in the postseason. Monday's outcome against Notre Dame will not significantly alter the 2023-24 team's legacy come March. There is another game against a top-15 pre-season opponent six days later against Maryland.

But from a 30,000-foot level, this is a marker. Like pencil lines on a door frame for a growing child, this is a clear indicator of growth as much as those previous marks.

Tournament. Final Four. National Championship. Paris.

Everything this program has done, everywhere it has been and anywhere it might go is still in some part thanks to those early years.

"Proud," Sutton said when asked about her reaction to the game in Paris. "Extremely honored to still be part of the conversation. Excited for the players on the team right now, the coaching staff, the entire fanbase and for South Carolina."

Not only are they part of the conversation, they helped start it entirely.

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