Silva, Kotsar trying to be productive in paint

SOUTH CAROLINA GAMECOCKS BASKETBALL

Coming into this season, the Gamecocks were hoping for big things out of Maik Kotsar and Chris Silva, two of the longest-tenured players on the team and big reasons why the Gamecocks either won or lost.

So far, the contributions the two have given through six games haven’t been up to par with what the coaching staff would like.

“They’ve been with me three and four years,” Frank Martin said after South Carolina’s 81-61 loss to Wofford. “They have to figure out a way to play for us. They’re not playing for us right now. They’re just kind of doing their own thing.”

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Their struggles continued somewhat in that double-digit loss to the Terriers. The duo combined for 21 points, but shot just 7-for-20 (35 percent) from the field, although Kotsar did hit two of his three three-pointers.

They did haul in a combined 18 rebounds with Kotsar posting his first double-double against a Power 5 opponent.

Where Martin’s frustrations reside is on the offensive end with the two most-senior members of the team.

“Our big guys do not score the ball in the paint. I’m calling plays for them and they don’t even know what plays they’re supposed to run. That’s not on them; that’s on me,” Martin said. “That’s my job to make sure guys do what they’re supposed to do. Where it gets a little frustrating for me is when you call plays that have been called the same thing and the same action for three or four years you’d think the guys who have the most starts in our program would understand those plays by now.”

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And it’s hard when the team’s two big pieces down low are having a hard time scoring, because that means it’ll be harder for guards to get better looks on the perimeter.

With Kotsar and Silva struggling, the Gamecocks shot just 33.3 percent from the field and had to settle for 25 three pointers, making just seven of them (28 percent).

“If we get set with threes or going inside, it’s not going to work. We try and put it in the paint, we try to get open shots,” Felipe Haase said.

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The Gamecocks scored a season-low 61 points Monday night and didn’t top 70 points for the third time in six games.

The problem a lot of the time Monday, Hassani Gravett said, came on the defensive end.

“There were times when guys weren’t executing the plays that were called. That screws up the offensive plan we set,” Gravett said. “Sometimes we got the ball out and didn’t push it as fast in transition when we needed to. At the end of the day, we didn’t get out and play transition defense good enough.”