Gamecocks get unexpected boost before game
Coming into the season, Tyrone Johnson was not supposed to be able to play until next semester.
But on Friday, he received an unexpected phone call from coach Frank Martin, who sneakily revealed the news to the junior.
“I started talking to him about his role and how he has been keeping everyone in tune and I said, ‘Ty, you can’t lose your focus, you have to do your job and you have to make those young guys do better,’” Martin said. “I said, ‘It’s very important, because tomorrow when you’re out there—’ and he goes, ‘Whoa, what do you mean?’”
“I said, ‘You’re cleared. You’re in,’ and he just started screaming on the phone,” Martin said.
Johnson immediately took advantage of his playing time, scoring South Carolina’s first three points en route to a game-high 18 in the Gamecock’s 82-44 dismantling of Longwood.
South Carolina never trailed in the contest and outrebounded the Lancers 50-27 while notching eight blocks on the day. Sophomore Mindaugas Kacinas led South Carolina with a career-high 14 rebounds, and both Brenton Williams and Sindarius Thornwell chipped in 14 points.
But the real story was Johnson, a transfer guard from Villanova who averaged three points and two assists while playing nearly 18 minutes per game with the Wildcats.
“I prepare myself as if my number is going to be called any day,” Johnson said. “I took practice every day as a game. I tried to push tempo, I tried to lead these guys on and off the court and I just try to be the most aggressive person I can be. Today my number was called, and I was very happy about that.”
The Gamecocks held Longwood to a 22.8 shooting percentage and quickly built up a big lead after a slow start. Back-to-back three pointers by sophomore Michael Carrera, who finished with 12 points and nine rebounds, gave South Carolina an 18-4 lead nine minutes into the game.
It took the Lancers almost six minutes to score a point but the Gamecocks weren’t much better, scoring six points in the same time frame.
Martin took the blame for the slow start, saying he has focused a lot of time in practice on the team’s man-to-man defense, which has taken away some time from the offense to prepare for zone defense.
“As you see, as the game continued and they started listening to us a little bit on the sideline and we did a better job of explaining what we needed to do, we started attacking that zone a little better,” Martin said.
After the Lancers trimmed the lead down to seven points with just under six minutes to go in the first half, South Carolina used a 7-0 run to open up a double-figure lead that they would keep for the rest of the afternoon.
The Gamecocks shot 49.1 percent from the field and took advantage of something they saw in the Longwood team.
“The coaches said before the game that they aren’t that physical of a team,” Kacinas said. “So we just needed to crash the boards and as you see, we got a lot of rebounds.”
Because of all the first-year players on the team, Martin was impressed with the team’s performance in their first official game together.
“Extremely happy with our guys (and) our rebounding and attention to detail on defense,” Martin said. “We got a little lackadaisical in the second half, but when you have so many young kids that’s understandable. It’s not acceptable, but it’s understandable. But we’ll work on that.”