UK Hoops finds its footing in win over Gamecocks

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UK senior center Eleia Roddy drives past a South Carolina defender in the Cats' 61-47 victory on Thursday. Roddy scored 11 points and grabbed 11 rebounds in the win. Photo by Kristin Sherrard | Staff

The Cats needed a breakthrough.

That’s exactly what senior center Eleia Roddy said the UK women’s basketball team had in the 61-47 victory over South Carolina on Thursday night at Memorial Coliseum.

The Cats (13-10, 3-5 Southeastern Conference) entered the game on a four-game losing streak, the longest of the Matthew Mitchell era.

“We knew we needed one,” sophomore guard Amber Smith said. “We needed one in a bad way. I’m on cloud nine right now.”

UK never trailed, taking a 14-4 lead early in the first half. UK outmatched South Carolina (9-12, 1-7) in almost every aspect of the game. The Cats’ lead was never in serious jeopardy, but they couldn’t quite get the Gamecocks fully out of their rear-view mirror.

What had been a 24-point lead disappeared late in the second half, as South Carolina used a 19-3 run to pull within eight points. Mitchell was still pleased to get the win, even if his team let up at the end.

“I’ll tell you what, this is a 14-point win in the Southeastern Conference and we are just pleased and real happy to get it,” Mitchell said. “I’ll take a 14-point win for the rest of the year. That would be great.”

UK did it with its trademark defense and rebounding, holding South Carolina to 23.6 percent shooting from the floor and out-rebounding the Gamecocks 49-29. Smith said that after practicing all week, the team was confident they would come out strong on the boards.

“These past few days, that’s all we’ve been working on,” Smith said. “One practice, we just did all rebounding. We knew we were going to out-rebound them. We knew it. We had to.”

South Carolina was without two of its best players, seniors Brionna Dickerson and Demetress Adams. Dickerson leads the team with 13.4 points and is expected to return within the next few games.
Before Adams suffered a season-ending knee injury, she was second on the team with 10.7 points per game, and she led the team in rebounding. Still, South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley didn’t want to use those injuries as an excuse after the game, characterizing her team’s play as “piss poor.”

“We don’t compete for 40 minutes,” Staley said. “We are who we are as far as what we bring to the table in skill, but that’s no excuse to not bring the effort.”

Roddy led the Cats with her tenth double-double of the season. She registered 11 points and grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds. Smith had a team-high 13 points, and sophomore forward Victoria Dunlap added 10 points and six boards.

Mitchell didn’t want to look too far ahead to the final games of the season, but knew just how important the win was for his team.

“If we win tonight, maybe we’re one game out or maybe two games out of fourth or fifth (place in the SEC),” Mitchell said. “And that’s what you’re trying to get back into it after the bad start. Just keep trying to stay focused on the game in front of you. We’re certainly in better shape tonight after winning one.”