COLUMBIA — A 17-4 run to begin the second half allowed the University of South Carolina Gamecocks to pull away from the Newberry College Wolves and earn a 107-89 win in an exhibition game at Colonial Life Arena Sunday, November 6.
“I am ridiculously proud of my players for not being intimidated,” Newberry College coach Dave Davis said. “Most of the guys who played tonight have either played very little for us or were playing tonight for the first time. We certainly made some mistakes, but I thought our kids played extremely hard and aggressive. For a lot of the game, I thought we did a pretty good job of taking South Carolina out of what they wanted to do and kind of got the game at the tempo we wanted, which we thought was our only chance.”
Despite being a Division II school up against a team from the Southeastern Conference, the Wolves were not intimidated by their opponent and it showed on the court.
The Gamecocks’ Chris Silva opened the game with a bucket, for a 2-0 South Carolina lead. Xavier Hill responded, tying the game. Malik Kotsar and P.J. Dozier scored the next four points as the Gamecocks opened a 6-4 lead. But again, Newberry College had an answer.
A 6-2 run, including a 3-pointer from Nielsen Sikander, gave the Wolves a 10-8 lead. South Carolina bounced back with a 14-2 run; with points coming from Sindarius Thornwell, Justin McKie, and Duane Notice to take a 22-12 lead. Once again, Newberry didn’t go away.
Three 3-pointers by Mason Spease, along with 3-pointers from Lange and James Stepp tied the game with 6:49 left in the first half. A 3-pointer on the next possession by Thornwell gave the Gamecocks the lead back. The South Carolina lead grew to as many as eight points, 43-35 with 4:20 left.
Newberry trimmed the deficit to 51-46, before a bucket by TeMarcus Blanton pushed the Gamecock lead to seven points at halftime.
South Carolina quickly widened its lead early in the second half. Aided by points from Thornwell, Notice, and Dozier, the Gamecocks went on a 17-4 run to take a 70-50 lead.
Lange was able to get the deficit down to 17 points, but nine straight points from South Carolina, from Dozier and Thornwell, pushed the lead to 81-55. Newberry rallied, going on a 22-10 run, to shrink the deficit to 91-77. Gerald Evans, Jamaal Satisfield, and D.J. Copeland all scored during the run.
That was as close as the Wolves would get, as the Gamecocks finished the game scoring 17 of the last 29 points to claim the 18-point win.
“I just feel unbelievable about my guys in that they can come into a really tough environment and handle themselves well and keep fighting through adversity,” Davis said. “I thought those were terrific things. We’re a very young team. We’ll have this team basically intact for two years. To know you can compete with a SEC team on their home court is something that I think will give us confidence as we play our entire season.”
Stepp and Sikander each led Newberry with 13 points. Spease contributed 12 points, while Lange finished with 11 points. The Wolves had five players finish with double figure scoring.
For the game Newberry went 18-for-40 from 3-point range.
“I told them not to shoot layups, unless somebody had jumped before they got there. They didn’t follow that direction exactly perfectly,” Davis said. “I told them at halftime we had a better chance to make threes than layups against their size. We used the 3-point line more tonight than we normally do. We got unbelievable shots to start the game; I think we were 2-of-10 from 3-point range to start. If we made some of those I think we could have gotten some momentum and maybe gotten a lead that was sustainable. It’s hard to argue with 18-40 from the 3-point line, that’s not a bad percentage.”