Published Nov 16, 2023
WBB Blasts Clemson 109-40 13th Straight Rivalry Win: "Poetry In Motion"
Alan Cole  •  GamecockScoop
Staff Writer
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@Alan__Cole

28-0.

Not a football score, not an individual stat or a team's record. It was South Carolina women’s basketball’s overall run against Clemson that started midway through the first quarter at Colonial Life Arena.

The Gamecocks turned an already large 17-6 advantage into an incomprehensible 45-6 lead over their Palmetto rivals in the space of a little more than 10 minutes, blowing Clemson out of the building en route to a 109-40 win. The 28-point frenzy accounted for not just South Carolina's longest run this season, but a run longer than any it had throughout the entirety of last year's 36-1 year.

Through 120 minutes of the 2023-24 season, the identity shift for this team in the post-Freshies era looks clearer than ever after putting up two of the top four scoring games of the entire 16-season Dawn Staley era in the space of five days and reaching triple-digits in three straight games for the first time in program history.

Speed, excitement and enough up-and-down action to rival a tennis match.

"People that come and they pay their money to watch us play, they really are entertained," Staley said. "The game was in hand, but no one left the game. That was an incredible thing."

It was South Carolina’s (3-0) 13th consecutive win in the rivalry, and a milestone night for Staley as she picked up her 200th career win at Colonial LIfe Arena in just 234 games in the program’s 43rd consecutive home win overall.

Anywhere you looked you could find an eye-popping number in the box score, little nuggets of dominance scattered throughout a 69-point bludgeoning. And once again MiLaysia Fulwiley was right in the middle of it. In the eye test she produced more highlights that looked like a snippet of a Harlem Globetrotters game, and the tangible numbers were not far away from it. The freshman phenom very nearly pulled in her first career double-double with 18 points and nine rebounds, knocking down four 3-pointers in the process.

"I feel like my shot isn't the best, but I feel like it's really good," Fulwiley said. "I feel like I sleep on my shot, so when I shoot it and it goes in I have a late reaction because I don't expect it to go in, so when it goes in I just react and celebrate. But I feel like my shot has actually come along since high school."

Shooting was contagious all night for an offense which scored points on 64.9 percent of its trips down the floor.

Te-Hina Paopao got the ball rolling from deep though, hitting her first four 3-point attempts of the night to help the Gamecocks race out to a double-digit lead inside the first four minutes of action. The Oregon transfer getting her first taste of the rivalry scored 14 points on eight shots in another efficient performance.

Chloe Kitts picked up where she left off after her double-double against Maryland by pouring in another 12 points, her hottest stretch coming in a quick six-point burst early in the second half and Ashlyn Watkins turned in her second consecutive double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds. Raven Johnson only scored six points, but made some history with 17 assists, the most ever by a Gamecock against Clemson and just one away reaching the program's all-time record for a single game.

"That's the beauty of basketball," Johnson said. "Sharing the ball, finding the open person, it's called poetry in motion. You find the person that's open, they hit the open shot, you celebrate. Because an assist is like a point, that's how I look at it. It's just poetry in motion; it's like art."

On the injury front there was one pregame note for South Carolina. Freshman guard Tessa Johnson did not play with what the team called a “lower leg injury” and was seen with crutches and a boot on her right foot during pre-game warm-ups.

The Gamecocks will look to keep the 100-point streak going with the third of their four-game homestand on Monday night against South Dakota State.

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