SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The South Carolina women’s basketball team is heading back to the Final Four for the sixth year in a row, becoming just the second team to do so in NCAA history.
The No. 1-seeded Gamecocks defeated No. 3 seed TCU 78-52, marking the fourth straight game they beat their opponent by at least 25 points. Heading into Monday’s Elite Eight matchup, the Gamecocks had a 135-point differential over their opponents, and they scored at least 90 points in the first three rounds — including consecutive 100-point games in the rounds of 64 and 32.
Although the game ended in blowout fashion, South Carolina had to fight TCU early. The Horned Frogs opened the game on a 6-0 run, handing the Gamecocks their first deficit of the entire tournament. But after being outscored 12-4 in the first five minutes of the game, South Carolina went on a 12-2 run to close the period.
The Gamecocks took another monster run at the end of the second quarter, this time outscoring the Horned Frogs 17-5 to give them a slight cushion at halftime.
South Carolina blew the game open in the fourth quarter, where it held TCU scoreless for the first four minutes of the period and went on a 14-0 run.
Sophomore forward Joyce Edwards scored 11 of her 24 points in the fourth and finished the game with 12 rebounds. Raven Johnson had 10 points, eight rebounds and six assists. Agot Makeer had 18 points.
TCU’s Olivia Miles finished with 18 points and six assists.
Next, the Gamecocks will face UConn in a rematch of last year’s national championship game that saw the Gamecocks lose 82-59.
This will be the second straight season the Final Four is composed of South Carolina, Texas, UCLA and UConn. There has been only one other instance in which the same four teams played in back-to-back Final Fours.
Leave a Reply