When Frank Martin was watching Seventh Woods in high school the obvious talent was there—the dunking, the quickness, the pure athleticism—but Martin saw something deeper than that.
Watching Woods play at Hammond, minutes away from the basketball offices, he noticed a skill set lending itself to being a really good defender at the college level.
It took a while for Martin and the Gamecock staff to see it in person—Woods went to North Carolina out of high school and wound up at South Carolina last season after transferring—but their hunches were confirmed.
“He’s going to be a pain in the ass on the ball,” South Carolina assistant Bruce Shingler said. “Guarding the ball, he’s going to be a pain. His defensive instincts, his quick twitch and knack for the ball will definitely help us defensively.”
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And looking at his measurables and his skill set, it makes sense why Woods would be a good defender. In the year before transferring, Woods was fourth in defensive rating (94.5) and fifth on the team in defensive box plus-minus (4.2).
While he didn’t really break through at North Carolina—he averaged 1.8 points in 8.7 minutes over his career for the Heels—the Gamecocks are confident that athleticism hasn’t dipped.
“I am a little surprised that people just forgot about him. I’m like, this guy was an unbelievable player out of high school and he played at North Carolina,” assistant Chuck Martin said. “The one thing that gets lost in all of this is his intelligence and his experience. This is a guy who every day in practice at North Carolina was probably matched up against a pro. He understands distance. He understands angles. He understands how to pressure you.”
He had a year to get his body and game ready, spending a lot of his time away from playing in games working on his offensive game to try and get some of the aggressiveness back he had in high school.
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“You could see a little more fire in his game. You can see his confidence level took a turn to the high,” Shingler said. “I think he’s comfortable. I always tell kids, if you can get one year of Frank and knowing him for a year when the pressure’s of you, a Jermaine Couisnard type of year, that helps you understand frank a little more from how he coaches others.”
It took him a while, but something clicked as Woods got more comfortable with the coaching staff and his teammates he really started to play better in practice and his offensive game, including his jump shot, started to get better.
He worked a lot individually with Chuck Martin on improving his jump shot and was pretty eager to receive that kind of help.
“Sometimes when kids face adversity, they don’t know how to handle it and ask for help,” Chuck Martin said. “That hasn’t been the case with Seventh at all. To me, that’s been the most impressive thing: how willing he is to learn and listen and actually execute the things we’re trying to work on. I think he’s improved his shot quite a bit.”
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The skill set is there and now it’s about Woods finding a role on a talented team to try and get the Gamecocks back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2017.
The Gamecocks have a handful of guards returning that got minutes last year in Couisnard, Trae Hannibal, TJ Moss and potentially AJ Lawson that Woods will have to vie for minutes with next season, but he has the tools to make an impact.
“I think he’s going to be a great defender. Offensively, he’s going to give us another guy just like Jermaine that can play off the dribble, get in the lane and make plays for others. He’s a pass-first guy, always has been. We have to work really hard. He had lost his aggressiveness before,” Frank Martin said. “Over the last month of the season in practice he was coming downhill and being aggressive. He’s starting to make jump shots, which as he continues to trust that it’s going to allow him to be even better.”
