No. 14 Texas Tech travels to South Carolina for the Big 12/SEC Challenge on Saturday in what promises to be a defense-lover’s dream match-up.
Chris Beard’s Red Raiders and Frank Martin’s Gamecocks both rank in KenPom’s top 25 defenses, which should make this game a defensive grind from start to finish.
The Red Raiders (16-4) have been the surprise of the Big 12, capturing a road win at Kansas to start off league play. The Red Raiders also own home wins against West Virginia and Nevada.
Meanwhile, South Carolina has become one of the hottest teams in the SEC lately as it works its way back up to the bubble. The Gamecocks have recently grabbed two road wins at Georgia and Florida to go along with an impressive home win over Kentucky.
If the Gamecocks want to continue their recent run of success, they’ll need to focus on a few important areas against Texas Tech.
Continue to get to the free-throw line
South Carolina has developed an all-around team philosophy of attacking the rim and getting fouled.
In fact, the Gamecocks almost shoot a free throw for every two shot attempts they take.
South Carolina easily leads the SEC in free-throw attempts, with almost 25 percent of its points coming at the line – a figure that is good for fourth in the nation.
Though Texas Tech is not especially foul prone, South Carolina needs to continue to carve out an identity as a grind-it-out offensive team. This is necessary for the Gamecocks because they are one of the worst overall shooting teams in the country.
When points don’t come easy, you have to go to the rim.
In South Carolina’s four SEC wins, it has averaged an astonishing 33.5 free throw attempts a game. In the Gamecocks’ four SEC losses, they have averaged only 26 per game. That’s anywhere from 5-7 points a game difference.
Free-throws matter, especially to this team.
Cut down on the turnovers
Cutting down on turnovers against Texas Tech is going to be a steep, but important challenge for the Gamecocks.
The Red Raiders are the tenth best squad in the country at turning teams over, with opponents turning it over against them on almost a quarter of their possessions.
South Carolina finally has its full complement of guards healthy, so the turnover issues may be behind Martin’s squad. However, the stats show that they have turned it over a bunch this season.
To compound those issues, the Gamecocks get their shots blocked more than all but six teams in the country. Those blocked shots are part of the price to pay for getting so many foul calls at the rim.
However, some of those blocked shots turn into turnovers which create offense for the opposition.
Luckily, Texas Tech doesn’t have an elite shot blocker like most SEC teams do.
Get Chris Silva the ball
Silva has been putting up SEC Player of the Year type numbers as of late.
In conference play, Silva has posted two 27 point games—he also scored 18 points and grabbed 12 rebounds in South Carolina’s win at Florida earlier in the week.
The only way to stop Silva as of late has been to keep him off the floor.
In the Gamecocks’ last two losses, Silva averaged only 22 minutes because of foul trouble. He finished those games with single-digit scoring efforts.
In order for the Gamecocks to score an impressive win and secure a spot on the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble, Silva is going to have to stay out of trouble.