South Carolina plays its third game in seven days when it visits the surprising Florida Gators Sunday.

1. Who is available?

Everyone, Dawn Staley said (except for Raven Johnson).

Wait, what?

That’s right, everyone. For the first time in six weeks, since the Maryland and Duke games in mid-December, South Carolina will have the same roster in back-to-back games. That’s a stretch of nine games, nearly half the season, and doesn’t take into account all the changes before those games. And unlike those games, when South Carolina was without Destanni Henderson, this is as healthy as it gets for the Gamecocks.

That means, as it did at the beginning of the season, that there will be some very good players that might not get off the bench in some games. It might be Destiny Littleton only playing two minutes against Ole Miss, or Kamilla Cardoso only playing six minutes at Arkansas. The key to keeping everyone happy, Staley said, is communication and making sure players know their “importance is not playing-time driven.”

“We’re all healthy, which we haven’t been in this big of a stretch. Knock on wood. It’s going to be hard to play a lot of players. Everybody’s practicing well and hard and executing, but 15 on a roster that’s healthy, that’s ready to go, that’s been productive in practice is hard,” she said. “The bottom line is winning and we do a really good job of communicating with them and letting them know it’s hard to play ten players in a half, but we’ve been teetering on that.”

2. Rivers

Look no further than Saniya Rivers to see the effect of so many players. Rivers was a national player of the year as a high school senior, when she led the nation in scoring. Heading into the season, the scouting report on Rivers was that she was a natural scorer, good passer, but weak defender. Point guard was not included.

“I promised Aliyah and my team at the beginning of the season that I’d do whatever I had to do to come in and be the player that I could be to help us get what we all want, a national championship,” Rivers said. “I’ve been working in practice, locking in.”

Staley acknowledged that Rivers initially didn’t like the idea of playing point guard. BUt she stuck to her promise and learned the position. Now, even though Rivers has struggled with her shot (she’s 11-47 for the season), she has found a role as a backup point guard and defensive specialist.

“I think she’s more comfortable and less afraid to make mistakes,” Staley said. “She’s more committed, and it was her. We’ve wanted this, but young people move at their own pace and you’ve got to give them space to process. She sees it a little bit different.”

Listed at 6-2, but even longer, and extremely athletic, it’s tough for opposing point guards to get by Rivers or pass around her.

“I’ve seen her develop so well over the past couple of weeks. Her confidence is going back up,” Aliyah Boston said. “She's been locked in. She's asked questions if she’s not sure about it.”

3. Defense

South Carolina remains inconsistent on offense, but on the defensive side of the ball the Gamecocks are playing at an elite level. After giving up just 30 to Vanderbilt (a score that led at least one person to insist the score had to be a typo), they held the Rebels to just 40 points, 31 below their season average. That was a total of 70 points over the course of the week, or just a couple of baskets more than what Kentucky and Missouri give up in the average game.

For the month of January, just one opponent has shot better than 40% (LSU, 42.4%), and just one other to shoot over 30% (Mississippi State, 37.0%, in a hastily scheduled game). South Carolina has held four straight opponents, and nine of its 20 opponents below 30% shooting.

It helps to have the best defensive player in the country anchoring your team (Boston). And to have the ACC Defensive Player of the Year backing her up (Kamilla Cardoso). Plus the chronically underrated Brea Beal locking down the wings. But it is more than the usual suspects. LeLe Grissett’s return adds another tough wing defender, and Bree Hall has more than lived up to her billing.. Victoria Saxton and Laeticia Amihere are underrated defenders. Destanni Henderson and Zia Cooke are quick, aggressive on-ball defenders, and as noted above, Rivers has developed into a strong defender.

That’s ten players who are good individual defenders, and they are playing together as a unit. Shakira Austin bemoaned that, “When the first person guarding you is 6-4, and then you beat them and the next person is 6-3, it’s hard,” and she was short-changing a couple of inches. It’s also why eliminating turnovers is so important for the Gamecocks: it’s really hard for teams to score without those easy baskets.

The SEC record for lowest field goal percentage is 32.8%, by LSU in 2007. South Carolina is on pace to tie that, but Tennessee is allowing just 31.1% this season. The all-time record is 30.0%, by UConn in 2010.

4. Wild, Wacky SEC

There were five SEC games Thursday night. Four of them were upsets, with only favored South Carolina beating #24 Ole Miss, and even with that game only the most die-hard Gamecocks idealist would have thought the Gamecocks could have held the Rebels to 40 points.

To recap: Vanderbilt upset Kentucky, which had just six players, Mississippi State upset Missouri, Arkansas upset #12 LSU, and the game that really shook up the standings, previously 0-7 Auburn upset previously 7-0 #4 Tennessee. South Carolina and Tennessee still control their own destiny, but with South Carolina hosting the lone game between the two, the Lady Vols went from having breathing room to an uphill battle. In the span of about two hours, a team like Ole Miss went from licking its wounds after a disappointing loss to only being a game out of first with a rematch against South Carolina still to come.

With still half the season to go, there is a lot of scoreboard watching, but the main thing is to take care of your business first.

“You’re looking. You’re jockeying,” Staley said. “In this league, anything can happen. Nothing is really an upset to us because it’s happening too frequently. We know our worth as a league. You can tell. Florida’s in the top three. Ole Miss is up there. It’s anybody’s league to have at this point. You just have to control the controllables.”

5. Scouting the Gators

The Gators were picked to finish third from the bottom in the SEC. Over the summer, their coach resigned amid allegations of abuse. Then in early January they lost their best player, Lavender Briggs, to a season-ending injury and Briggs transferred to Maryland days later. Yet, almost halfway through the conference season, the Gators aren’t third from the bottom, they are third from the top of the SEC standings.

“They just seem like a really tight-knit group,” Staley said. “They believe in each other on both sides of the basketball and it’s producing big wins when probably everybody had them at the bottom of the league. You never know, that’s why you’ve got to play the games.”

Florida is winning with smoke and mirrors. The Gators don’t do anything especially well outside of pressuring the ball. Kiara Smith leads the Gators in scoring and assists with 14.3 points and 4.7 assists. She’s the clear leader and centerpiece for the Gators, with a revolving cast around her. Smith is the only player to start all 20 games, and ten players (not including Briggs) average at least 10 minutes a game.

The Ws

Who: #1 South Carolina (19-1, 7-1) at (15-5, 5-2)

When: Noon, Sunday, January 30

Where: I’m Still Calling It the O-Dome, Gainesville, FL

Watch: SEC Network

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