Even the casual observer of this year’s South Carolina basketball team could spot out Jalyn McCreary without any real hesitation.

McCreary, outside of Alanzo Frink, has probably the team’s most recognizable hair with a full head of dreads dotted with blue streaks bobbing up and down the court as quickly as he did.

Well, it should be had the team’s most recognizable haircut.

McCreary lopped it all off before the Kentucky game, making his outward appearance a little lower profile and right now it’s working.

“I decided to cut it because it was getting annoying,” he said, chuckling. “If I didn’t play basketball I’d probably still have it. I’ll grow it back out but not dreads.”

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What he lost in eccentric-ness in his outward appearance his game is far and away making up for it.

Since cutting his hair four games ago McCreary is in the middle of his best stretch as a Gamecock averaging 6.8 points and three rebounds and has missed just two of his 12 shots his last four games, including going off for a career-high 11 points in a 26-point win over Vanderbilt while shooting 4-for-5 from the field and 3-for-4 from the line.

He’s got an average offensive rating of 156 through the last four games and, the microcosm of his success is shown at the free throw line where he’s 7-for-9 after starting the year shooting less than 30 percent from the line.

“My confidence has been building up through the season as it keeps going on and getting better in practice every day by doing the right things; just keep rebounding and doing what I can to help the team,” he said. “My confidence is kind of high right now.”

It’s a full 180 from where he was at the end of non-conference play where McCreary played just four minutes the team’s final four non-SEC games and didn’t play the final three.

Since then he’s averaged 11.7 minutes per game and has played double-digit in five of his last six games.

The heel turn signifies a freshman finally getting feet under him as he gets older, and it’s not just him; his roommate and fellow big man Wildens Leveque is doing the exact same thing.

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“When they mess something up and you deal with them, which means you coach them, they don’t roll their eyes. They don’t stick their lower lip out. They get excited. They want you to help them,” Frank Martin said. “When people embrace that, I trust them. When I trust them, I play them. That’s part of the way the world works.”

Leveque didn’t have necessarily the flashiest stat line against Vanderbilt—two points, three rebounds—but he’s playing more and put together his best performance of the season two games ago and hoping to build off of it.

In his first start in seven games, Leveque went up against one of the best big men in the SEC, Austin Wiley, and finished with four points, three rebounds, a block and three steals while Wiley scored just six points and made one field goal.

“I had a pretty confident first half,” he said. “I think I have a lot of things to work on but building on that first half that’s what I envision for myself over the next couple games. I just have to keep building off that.”

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It didn’t happen overnight for either guy, but both are starting to see a little more action and responsibility in the Gamecocks’ game plan.

“It was a gradual thing, step by step getting better every day,” McCreary said. “It’s taking little steps by doing this right so I can move on to that and get better.”

Their emergence is something the two talk about all the time. As freshmen, they spend a lot of time together—they obviously practice at the same time, share a locker room and live together—so the relationship they’ve built is contributing to their success on the court.

“Jalyn and I are really close. We’re in it to win it together. We’re roommates. We talk to each other every day. Sometimes, when he’s not having a great practice, we lift each other up,” Leveque said. “Before games we talk to each other about how we have to get it. We’re freshmen so we’re in it together. I say we have a pretty strong relationship.”