South Carolina women’s basketball wraps up the first half of the SEC season with a trip to Tennessee. Find out how to watch and what to watch for against the No. 17 Lady Vols. 

1. Run Run Run

Tennessee is the highest-scoring team in the nation, averaging 93.4 points per game. That is nothing new for South Carolina, who is coming off of games against teams ranked fourth, 15th, fourth, and third entering the game.

Tennessee is different from those other teams, though. Tennessee leads the country with 33.9 three-point attempts per game, and the Lady Vols want to run and shoot for 40 minutes. 

On offense, they want to get up as many shots, especially threes, as possible. On defense, Tennessee presses and traps full court to make everything difficult. It wears opponents down physically and mentally, and all five players have to be on the same page.

“Being decisive and just going to the ball, meeting passes,” Te-Hina Paopao said. “Just being really decisive with the ball and knowing what you want to do with it.”

Against the Lady Vols, you have to be patient on offense, protect the ball, and not get sped up. Defensively, you have to stay glued to your player. The Lady Vols have issues scoring in the halfcourt when they aren’t getting stops. 

“There are certain things we need to take care of,” Dawn Staley said. “The ball is one. Two is defending our turnovers if we do turn the ball over. Three is obviously transition and the three-point line. Four is we’ve got to defend. Although you’re not going to disrupt them so much because they space you out, we’ve got to handle being able to guard one-on-one.”

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2. Depth

Both South Carolina and Tennessee use a lot of players. Tennessee has 10 players playing between 13 and 25 minutes. 

The Lady Vols aren’t afraid to substitute all five players at once. It’s all designed to make their press feel relentless and wear down opponents physically and mentally.

South Carolina did that earlier in the season, but more recently, Dawn Staley has preferred to frequently substitute one or two players at a time to stay fresh.

South Carolina’s 10-player rotation has shortened to eight recently due to injuries to Ashlyn Watkins and Maddy McDaniel. McDaniel has been slow to get back to where she was before suffering a concussion. She and Maryam Dauda have only gotten brief playing time lately, but this might be a game where Staley expands the rotation, especially if she needs another ball-handler like McDaniel.

“Good two days of practice,” Staley said. “I think she’ll play. I do think she’ll play. Her speed, her ability to be a little bit different than all of our guards, will pay dividends. We’re going to need that against Tennessee.”

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3. Three-point shooting

South Carolina shot just 2-13 against LSU and was 0-6 in the second half. That continues a recent trend. The Gamecocks were 10-28 against Oklahoma, but just 3-20 against Alabama and 3-7 against Texas.

That comes out to 26.5% (18-68) over the last four games. South Carolina has shot around 35% for most of the season. 

The strangest part of the recent slump is that most of the attempts have been open looks from Te-Hina Paopao, Tessa Johnson, and Bree Hall. That group normally shoots over 40%, but they are a combined 33.3% over the last four games.

They seem due for a breakout.

4. Availability report

South Carolina remains as healthy as it will be for the rest of the season. Only Ashlyn Watkins (Out) is listed on the availability report.

For Tennessee, Kaiya Wynn is Out. She’s been out all season with an Achilles injury.

The biggest availability question heading into the game doesn’t involve players, it involves Tennessee coach Kim Caldwell.

Caldwell said on Sunday that she plans to coach the Lady Vols Monday night, just seven days after giving birth to her first son, Conor Scott Caldwell, on Jan. 20. Caldwell returned to practice on Friday.

Caldwell missed the Lady Vols’ last game at Texas. Assistant coach Jenna Burdette led Tennessee in her absence.

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5. Scouting the Lady Vols

Tennessee rolled through the non-conference season undefeated, including a 139-59 win over NC Central, where the Lady Vols made a mind-boggling 30 three-pointers, an NCAA record.

It’s been a different story in SEC play, where the Lady Vols are 3-4. However, those four losses have been by one point to 13th-ranked Oklahoma, two points to No. 6 LSU, one point to Vanderbilt, and four points at No. 7 Texas.

Ten-point margins can seemingly vanish in a flash with Tennessee, who came back from 19 down against Oklahoma and 18 down against LSU. But there are also the dry spells that dug those holes to begin with.

“The different style will probably take a little bit to adjust to,” Staley said. “We’ve got to make them adjust to us. The whole objective is for us to adjust to them. Then, somewhere in the middle, a team is going to have a run. I just hope it’s us.”

Caldwell has remade Tennessee through the transfer portal. The five players who have started and played the most are all transfers. All but one, Jewel Spear (12.8 points), who came from Wake Forest, are in their first season playing for the Lady Vols.

That includes Ruby Whitehorn (13.5 points), the highest-ranked recruit in Clemson history, who has finally realized her potential in Knoxville. Zee Spearman (11.1 points, 5.9 rebounds) was part of Miami’s surprising Elite Eight run in 2023. Samara Spencer (11.3 points, 5.5 assists) was part of the mass exodus in Arkansas following last season.

Lastly, there is former Gamecock Talaysia Cooper. Cooper was a freshman on the Gamecock team that lost to Iowa in the Final Four in Dallas. When South Carolina added Paopao out of the transfer portal the following offseason, there wasn’t much playing time left for Cooper.

Cooper decided to transfer late and missed the window to be immediately eligible. She sat out last season and has blossomed into one of the SEC’s best players this season. At 6-0, Cooper is a long, rangy athlete with a versatile game.

Caldwell’s system has maximized Cooper’s strengths and minimized her weaknesses. It’s a reminder of how much fit matters. Tennessee’s fluid, positionless style and pressing defense are perfect for Cooper.

Cooper is averaging 17.8 points, 5.7 rebounds, 3.4 assists, 3.3 steals, and is Tennessee’s leader in blocks. It’s a throwback to her high school career at East Clarendon when she had multiple quadruple doubles.

“A great player. A great player,” Staley said. “We recruit great players and we had great players in our program. I’m really happy for Coop. I’m happy that she’s found her happy place. She’s a bear to deal with because she can do it all. She can defend. She can score three levels. She can play multiple positions. I think the style of play fits perfectly for her.”

The Ws
Who: No. 2 South Carolina (19-1, 7-0) at No. 17 Tennessee (15-4, 3-4)
When: 7:00 ET, Monday, January 27
Where: Thompson-Boling Arena, Knoxville, TN
Watch: ESPN2

The Tennessee Titans are continuing to build a front office staff to help turn things around in the Music City.

“The Titans continue to add expertise to their front office, as they are set to hire Dolphins executive Reggie McKenzie in a key, senior scouting role, sources say,” NFL Network insider Ian Rapoport tweeted.

“The former Raiders GM and respected personnel man will support Mike Borgonzi, Chad Brinker, and Dave Ziegler.”

McKenzie, 61, interviewed for the general manager position, and while the team elected to go with Borgonzi instead, the Titans appeared to really like him as well.

McKenzie has over three decades of experience in NFL front offices with the Green Bay Packers (1994-2011), Oakland Raiders (2012-18) and Dolphins (2019-24).

McKenzie won two Super Bowls with the Packers in 1996 and 2010, so his championship experience should come in handy for the Titans.

Now, the Knoxville native is coming closer to home as he joins the Titans staff under Borgonzi.

The Titans will continue building their staff as they prepare for the Shrine Bowl this weekend and the NFL Combine, which takes place next month at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.

Make sure you bookmark Tennessee Titans on SI for the latest news, exclusive interviews, film breakdowns and so much more!

AUBURN — It was a long two weeks of rehabilitation and urgency for Auburn All-American center Johni Broome.

After turning his left ankle seriously against South Carolina two weeks ago, Broome missed two games before finally returning to the practice courts during the middle of last week. He wore a protective boot around the practice gym and around campus up until Wednesday.

Broome practiced on Thursday and Friday, but still entered Saturday somewhat of a game time decision. During the day Saturday, the final decision was made that Broome would indeed play, but he wouldn’t start.

Three minutes into the game, he took the court, and 30 minutes later, Broome finished with a game-high 16 points, 13 rebounds and three more blocked shots.

Against the nation’s No. 1 defense, it was the kind of game that should vault Broome back atop the National Player of the Year standings.

“It felt amazing to go out there and compete with my brothers,” Broome said. “This week was very rough. Ultimately, I wanted to be out there to help them win, help them grind it out. It was a rough one, but we got it done.”

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Broome credited Senior Athletic Trainer Clark Pearson and Director of Sports Performance Damon Davis, among others, for aiding in his return. In all, Broome spent 10-hour days rehabbing and preparing for Tennessee during the last week, culminating in 33 minutes of action on Saturday night.

When asked postgame what the percentage health of his ankle was, Broome gave a quick answer.

“Good enough to play,” he said.

And it also didn’t hurt Broome’s chances of playing when he woke up on Saturday morning to pieces of paper with the Tennessee logo drawn on it stuck underneath his windshield. Broome assumed it was Tennessee fans doing some good-natured taunting.

“At that moment, I knew I was playing no matter what,” he said.

In the final minute, Broome racked up two rebounds and one all-important assist to Miles Kelly for the game-winning three. Broome said the under-4 timeout, with Tennessee up by four, it was do-or-die time for the Tigers.

“Let’s get four stops,” Broome said of the message in the huddle. “The offense will come.”

The offense did come, as Tahaad Pettiford hit a floater to bring Auburn within two, followed by Kelly’s big three, and then another free throw by Pettiford, giving Auburn a 6-0 run to end the game.

While Auburn sits at 18-1 on the season, with seven ranked wins and 11 Quad I wins, things haven’t come easy. The Tigers’ win on Saturday was their sixth win by five points or less this season. It’s quite the contrast to last season, when nearly every game Auburn won was by double digits.

“Last year, we won every game by double digits. This year, we beat South Carolina at the buzzer, then Texas, close game, Georgia close game, here close game, Maui close games, Houston close game,” Broome said.

“You go down the line on how many close games we’ve had and it shows the grit of this team. The last four minutes, if it’s a close game, we huddle up and rely on our defense.”

Given Broome’s performance, is there any mystery heading into a new week about Broome’s health and whether he will return to the starting lineup? The short answer from Bruce Pearl: no.

“He’ll be back,” Pearl said. “Oh yea, he’s back.”