Who: #6 South Carolina (24-3, 12-1) at Vanderbilt (19-8, 6-7), Nashville, TN
Time/TV: 3:00 pm streaming on SEC Network+.
Line: SC -16.5. Total: 159.5
History: South Carolina leads 22-21 all-time but trails 9-11 in Nashville. Carolina is 17-2 against the Dores under Dawn Staley. The Gamecocks have won the last 16 meetings including the last eight on the Commodores home court. South Carolina has not lost at Vanderbilt under Dawn Staley. Vandy's last win in the series was an overtime thriller in Columbia in 2012.
Last Meeting: January 28, 2024. Carolina 91-74. South Carolina was sluggish out of the gate as this meeting with Vanderbilt came on the heels of the most emotional game of the regular season, a 76-70 win in Baton Rouge. USC clamped down defensively in the second quarter and didn't look back as five Gamecocks finished in double figures with 20 assists on 35 made field goals in the 91-74 South Carolina victory. Kamilla Cardoso led all Gamecocks with 23 points.
South Carolina’s last trip to Memorial Gymnasium resulted in a 96-48 victory on Jan. 19, 2023.
Scouting the Dores
Vanderbilt has two of the best young players in the SEC, which make them capable of pulling an upset on any given night. Mikayla Blakes would be a shoe-in for SEC Freshman of the Year (if not for Joyce Edwards), she'll also be a Freshman All-American and possibly the Freshman of the Year nationally. She's averaging 23.4 points per game. Blakes, the 8th-ranked recruit in the 2024 class, has posted two 50+ point games in SEC play. The games where Blakes explodes for 30+ points (5 such occasions) she makes a living on the foul line. Blakes was held to just 12 points by LSU, but she scored 22 at Texas while shooting 8-for-14 from the field. The only weakness in her offensive game has been turnovers, at times she will try to do way too much resulting in bad turnovers.
The other young Commodore star is Khamil Pierre. The Sophomore post is averages 20.8 points and 9.7 rebounds with 2.9 steals. She averaged 8.9 points and 5.3 rebounds last season. Pierre is 6'2 and will struggle defensively against quality posts.
Despite the two stars, Vanderbilt has a losing record in conference play and have lost 4-of-5 coming into today. They have wins over Tennessee and Alabama and played LSU within in six points in Baton Rouge. The Commodores are not a great defensive team, as evidenced by the 101 points they gave up to Oklahoma on Thursday night.
Vanderbilt is coached by Shea Ralph, a former UConn star and assistant coach. Ralph is in her fourth season in Nashville after spending the previous 13 seasons as an assistant coach alongside Geno Auriemma. While serving as a coach at her alma mater, Ralph helped guide the Huskies to 12 Final Four appearances and six national championships, including a record four consecutive titles from 2013-16. Vanderbilt made the NCAA last season and they are currently projected as a 7-seed by ESPN.
SEC Tournament Seeding
As our readers know, if Texas and South Carolina finish the SEC both at 15-1 in league play, splitting the season series, a coin flip will determine the #1 seed. Why not overall margin of victory? Great question- the SEC instead would prefer to determine its top seed based on a random coin flip. If the conference slate ends in chalk, then LSU will be the #3 seed. Texas and South Carolina would obviously not prefer to have to play LSU and each in other in back-to-back games.
South Carolina finishes at Vanderbilt today, at Ole Miss Thursday and Kentucky at home a week from today, Texas is at Georgia tomorrow night, at Miss St on Thursday night and at home against Florida on Sunday. Both teams will be favored in their final three games, but at Ole Miss is the most difficult game remaining.
