The South Carolina women's basketball team survived a second-half surge from Kentucky Saturday, securing a 89-77 win in the final minutes.
Alaina Coates played just four minutes off the bench before reaggravating her ankle injury, but her fellow All-American, A'ja Wilson, filled the void with 26 points and eight rebounds. Wilson was the go-to scorer for the Gamecocks later on, but she had a lot of help in the first half from freshman Mikiah Herbert Harrigan, who had 14 of her career-high 17 points before the break.
"Weeks ago, Kiki made a decision to give an extra effort whether that's staying a little bit later with our strength and conditioning coach, getting shots up with our coaches, or coming in and getting extra film sessions," Staley said.
Herbert Harrigan set a career-high with 10 rebounds in Friday's win over Georgia before Saturday's strong performance in her third career start.
South Carolina took a healthy 11-point lead into the locker room, but Kentucky put together a run late in the third quarter to cut the lead to three heading into the final 10 minutes. Makayla Epps (31 points, nine rebounds) and Evelyn Akhator (24 points, 11 rebounds) gave their rivals everything they could handle, but the Gamecocks finished it off at the free throw line, hitting 12 shots from the stripe in the final four minutes to pull away.
Dawn Staley tried to mix it up by putting several different defenders on Epps throughout the course of the game and switching into a zone to start the second half, but there was limited success. Freshman guard Tyasha Harris picked up four fouls while guarding the senior, and 5-foot-6 Bianca Cuevas-Moore didn't have the size to contain Epps.
Harris still got a lot of time on Epps, while Herbert Harrigan was tasked with guarding Akhator at times, meaning the Gamecocks had freshmen on Kentucky's two best players at times.
"We're real confident. We don't have a choice at this point," Staley said of those two matchups. "We've got to play them, and I think these are good learning experiences, because although Makayla Epps will be leaving, there's going to be another Makayla Epps in our league."
Wilson said that she'd miss Epps, a senior, but that the rivalry between the Gamecocks and Wildcats would continue.
South Carolina has now taken six straight from Kentucky over the last two seasons, including a 93-63 rout in last year's SEC semifinal.
The Gamecocks will look to three-peat as SEC Tournament champions Sunday, as they take on the winner of Mississippi State and Texas A&M at 3 p.m.