The South Carolina men’s basketball team has officially released its non-conference schedule for the 2017-18 season.
The Gamecocks will play one exhibition against Erskine on October 30 before opening the regular season on the road at Wofford on November 10.
IT'S HERE! Check out our 2017-18 non-conference schedule!!
57 days until tip-off!!#Gamecocks ??? pic.twitter.com/HDQr2aRPSy
— Gamecock MBB (@GamecockMBB) September 14, 2017
Next, the team will play four games as part of the Puerto Rico Tip-Off tournament.
The first game, a non-bracketed contest against Western Michigan, will be played at home. After that, Frank Martin’s squad will head to Fajardo, P.R. to begin bracket play against Illinois State.
Other marquee match-ups include meetings with Temple, Clemson, and Texas Tech.
Analysis
Last season, South Carolina had its greatest season ever in advancing all the way to the Final Four before narrowly falling to Mark Few’s Gonzaga team.
The balanced, challenging non-conference schedule of last season certainly played an important role in helping to prepare the Gamecocks to achieve their goals of advancing deep into March Madness.
Some will say that this season’s schedule is not as balanced or as challenging. There is definitely some substance to this as South Carolina is only guaranteed to play one opponent that finished in the RPI Top 50 from a year ago (Illinois State).
With that being said, the Gamecocks will still have plenty of opportunities to prepare themselves for conference play and to pick up quality wins along the way.
Games against Temple, Clemson, and Texas Tech will allow South Carolina the opportunity to make a statement to the tournament committee, while games like the ones against Florida International, Wyoming, and Limestone will offer a team, who lost Sindarius Thornwell and P.J. Dozier to the NBA Draft, with a chance to gel in the early-goings of the new season.
During non-conference play, South Carolina will probably need to go close to unbeaten at home (lose one at most), win a couple of games in Puerto Rico, and steal a neutral site or road game to be where they would like to be going into SEC play.
It will be interesting to see whether this team can have similar success to that of last year’s squad and position itself nicely for a return trip to the NCAA Tournament.