South Carolina Gamecocks men's basketball in 'good place as a program'

But after the Final Four run, the Gamecocks lost a big chunk of their team with a senior class consisting of Sindarius Thornwell, Duane Notice and Justin McKie and PJ Dozier going pro.

Since then, they’ve spent the last three seasons building to try and get back to that place, and they’re getting very close.

“I think the fact we have depth and the fact we’re young, I think we’re going to be good for I think and hope for a number of years because of our youth and our depth. These guys all played major minutes and they all hand a hand in winning big games,” assistant Chuck Martin said. “That’s really important."

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Because of some transfers, Rakym Felder getting dismissed from the program and a few other things, the Gamecocks had to wait to get back to a place where they were in the two seasons they won a combined 51 games.

That doesn’t mean the Gamecocks have been devoid of talent but the issue’s been experience. Last year, they ranked No. 325 out of 353 teams in experience (12th in the SEC), averaging 1.08 years of experience.

“You can name any team in the country, but the teams that win are the older teams,” assistant Bruce Shingler said. “That’s the bottom line.”

Because they didn’t have a lot of experience—they had five seniors over the last two years—it meant younger guys like Lawson, Minaya and Bryant all had to shoulder starting roles as freshmen.

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“When you have a young guy who’s on a team but doesn’t play, he might have a good year the following year, but when you take a kid like AJ (Lawson) or Jermaine (Couisnard) or Keyshawn (Bryant) or Alanzo (Frink) and all those guys, they were a part of the Clemson win, the Virginia win, the Kentucky win, the A&M wins, the Georgia wins,” Martin said. “They played in those games. People don’t understand how valuable that is.”

That led to a few growing pains by way of non-conference play losses but they’ve shown improvement every year, hitting double-digit conference wins the last two seasons.

Now, the Gamecocks are expected to return eight of their top minute-getters and eight of their top scorers as well.

“We’ve found a couple guys and put together some good classes that fit us. It probably doesn’t look good on paper when it coms to rankings or numbers or stars, but it fits us and who we are as a program,” Shingler said. “You saw it through the past season. As we got older and grew, these guys got more mature and we became a better team. We had freshmen and sophomores and now we have sophomores and juniors. The freshmen that come in, they got some older guys who have been around to look up to.”

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The Gamecocks are bringing in two guys in in-state forwards Patrick Iriel and Ja’Von Benson, who now get to learn from guys like McCreary, Leveque and Alanzo Frink.

That, to Shingler, is “how programs are built” and “the older we get, the better we get. That’s pretty simple.”

Next season the goal will to take a program in a good place and get back to the NCAA Tournament.

“I think we’re in a good place as a program. As a staff we’re happy where we are,” Shingler said. “With the SEC and not getting a bite at the SEC tournament, that’s some hunger that’s going to lead into the next season.”