Early season matchups are always tough as teams figure out not only themselves but also scout teams with limited film on opponents.

It’s even tougher when the opponent has played one game over the past 612 days with the lone game coming against a Division III team.

That’s the challenge South Carolina faces after a season opening win, going on a quick turnaround against Princeton Friday night.

“The good thing is it’s the same coach and basically the same players,” Frank Martin said. “Bad thing is, it’s earlier in the year and there’s the element of surprise and whatever adjustments they made.”

The Tigers didn’t play a single game last season after the Ivy League canceled its 2020-21 season because of COVID, having to wait over a year to see the court again.

They did, drubbing Rutgers Camden 94-28 Tuesday night in what will be a gear up for the South Carolina game Friday in Asheville.

The Gamecocks—fresh off a 78-60 win over USC Upstate—do have some film on the Tigers from this season but having to rely on film from nearly two years ago luckily, Martin pointed out, with a lot of the same players.

“Early in the year, you have to pay attention to what you do know on the opponent and be very clear on what you’re trying to do,” Martin said.

“You have to make some in-game adjustments, and that’s the assistants. They have to earn their money. That’s where they’re real good. I go into certain games and tell whoever the scout guy is, ‘Hey, I’m really paying attention to us tonight, I need you to pay attention to what they’re doing.’ Other times I’m like, ‘Just make sure we’re running our stuff and I’m going to pay attention to the other team.’ That’s where your assistants have to be really good.”

The last time Princeton played, the Tigers were No. 150 in KenPom and sat at 14-13 (9-5 Ivy) before COVID shut down the conference tournaments.

It’s the first game of the Asheville Championship, an early season test for a South Carolina team still trying to break in eight scholarship newcomers in an event where they’ll play two games—Princeton and either Western Kentucky and Minnesota—over a 72 hour span.

The Gamecocks are scheduled to play at 9:30 p.m. ET (ESPN News) Friday and, similar to the NCAA Tournament, will play at either 5 p.m. or 7:30 p.m. Sunday.

“That’s going to be a little hit and miss for me early in the year. I have to learn this team. My gut right now is we’ve been really, really competitive and practice really hard,” Martin said.

“I haven’t had to push and prod to get these guys to go. So it’s my initial brain cells are telling me to manage it a certain way and that’s what I’m going to try and do. Will it work? I don’t have the answer for you because I haven’t been through it with these guys, but their preparation has allowed me to create an opinion on how to manage it.”

The same thing working against South Carolina is working against Princeton in terms of preparation is a good advantage for the Gamecocks at the same time, having so many new faces themselves and playing a little different than they did last season.

“If someone watches film on us last year they’re going to watch film this year and whatever defensive concepts you saw last year you wont’ see a lot of those this year,” Martin said. “Our team, I did some things offensively for last year’s talent, and we’re doing some things offensively for this year’s talent."

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