NASHVILLE — Wednesday in Nashville meant the end of the road for South Carolina men’s basketball last year, and everybody knew it.
The preliminary day of conference tournament action which only features the bottom four teams in the league standings was where last season ended, as the Gamecocks fell 67-61 to Ole Miss in the first game of the event to cap off a 11-21 season.
It was a disappointing, but not an overly surprising conclusion to a turbulent rebuilding year for Lamont Paris. Everyone knew a pivotal off-season of roster reconstruction and transfer portal work was ahead, but maybe not even the most optimistic of Gamecocks could have predicted how things would look next time the program stepped on the court at Bridgestone Arena.
"Man, I remember not sharing the court with those guys again,” Meechie Johnson said. “Like GG [Jackson] and Hayden Brown who was a senior, it was tough for him, especially in the locker room crying and seeing him hang his jersey up. When you've got a team like this, when you've got guys like Ta'Lon [Cooper] and B.J. [Mack] and the other guys, you don't want to send them home like that.”
This time, Johnson and the Gamecocks will not have to worry about Nashville being the last stop on the tour. South Carolina is 25-6 and surely heading to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2017 next week, but still has a chance to do some damage in Nashville.
South Carolina heads into the conference tournament seven seed lines higher than it did last year, this time spending Wednesday engaging in a light shootaround instead of preparing to play the opener.
From Johnson’s dancing to laughs everywhere and good vibes permeating through the court, a complete 180 in the vibe shift from last March.
“They're a confident group,” Paris said. “And certainly there's a different feel to it when you come in and have had the season that we've had. I just don't for one second think that the guys don't believe that they can beat any team that we play. Obviously a lot of teams feel that way, but they look back on what they've done this season, and there's a lot of evidence that would suggest they may be right."
South Carolina has not won a game in this event outside the first round since 2015, and any game period since winning a Wednesday opener in 2014 before immediately bowing out the following day.
Thursday’s opponent will be the winner of Wednesday night’s Arkansas vs. Vanderbilt game, two opponents the Gamecocks defeated by 15 and 13 points respectively in the regular season. A win there would push it to the quarterfinals against Auburn, a clear revenge game after the Tigers handed South Carolina its worst loss of the season, 101-61 on Feb 14.
"We've got a list of guys and teams that we want to take down,” Johnson said. “And that's our thoughts right now."
Last year, it was all about getting to the finish line. This year, it is all about moving forward.
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