2022 Women's March Madness: South Carolina-North Carolina Sweet 16 Preview
The Gamecocks and the Tar Heels in the Greensboro Coliseum for a trip to the Elite Eight. How could it get any sweeter?
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Welcome to the Sweet 16! This round arguably contains the best basketball of March Madness with the proper mixture of well-played games, upset potential and near-constant basketball. I’ll be in Greensboro for the Sweet 16, so let’s talk about what I’m calling the Bojangles Bowl between South Carolina and North Carolina. I already previewed Creighton-Iowa State for Jays247 so give that a read as well!
South Carolina’s spacing woes
South Carolina’s offense is officially a problem. Or at least it would be for most teams. The Gamecocks have only eclipsed an offensive rating of 100 in a game once since the postseason started, according to Her Hoop Stats.
In the second round against Miami, South Carolina took the bait from Miami and took the shots that the defense wanted them to take. They put up a measly 0.58 points per possession to become the first team to win an NCAA tournament game with that level of offensive efficiency in 105 tries since 2010. Teams with a points per possession of 0.58 or less in a game are 18-760 this season.
The biggest issue for South Carolina’s offense is spacing. Teams have stopped even pretending to guard shooters. Zia Cooke’s eFG% (39.6%) ranks 518th out of 578 players taking 10 or more shots per game and Destanni Henderson is 12 of 49 (24.5%) from the field in the postseason. While opponents will always focus more on the post than the perimeter against SC, look at how much Miami is able to sag into the paint here. Yet, Cardoso still threw it in to Boston and the Canes got a steal.
In fairness to the shooters, the Gamecocks are not finding them in good spots. Whether from the high or mid post or on drives, SC ball handlers have usually elected to pass into the crowded low block rather than to an open shooter.
“That's a tangible for us to make sure we're sharing the ball, seeing our teammates, seeing the weak side of the floor,” said Cooke on Thursday. “Just making it easier for ourselves when it comes to scoring and not making it hard.”
Henderson could get back to mid-season form in a hurry and Cooke was one of the nation’s most promising shooters in 2021. Add in some Destiny Littleton and the Gamecocks are in business. Still, their struggles against the Hurricanes are concerning for what’s ahead. Miami is a top-50 defense, but the Gamecocks will face top 10 defenses en route to the Final Four (including North Carolina).
All that being said, South Carolina is still 4-1 in the postseason with margins of victory of 22, 10, 58 (!), and 16. The Gamecocks are winning because they’re one of the best offensive rebounding and defensive teams in recent memory. Dawn Staley emphasized that their identity built in those areas gets them through a lot of problems. It’s why they have been the best team in the country all year and could still potentially win without getting the offense right. But if any team can get it together in a hurry, it’s South Carolina.
Hop(e) on the UNC bandwagon
The North Carolina Tar Heels may have surprised some folks by reaching to the Sweet 16. Over half of brackets in the ESPN Women’s Tournament Challenge had Arizona getting to this point whereas only 36% picked UNC. The Tar Heels are aware and they’ve been waiting for the general public to see them for who they are: a damn good basketball team.
"We definitely have been playing with a chip on our shoulder all season, and to see people now be like, ‘Oh, Carolina, y'all are actually good, Y'all made the Sweet 16.’ No, we've been good all year,” said sophomore Deja Kelly. “So for people to finally catch on, that's cool. But for the people that have been with us all season, shout out to y'all.”
The stats have backed up North Carolina all season. They’re currently 7th in the NCAA’s NET rating and 13th in Her Hoop Stats rating. UNC’s defense has been in the top 10 by pretty much any metric for the entire season. They’re a top 25 team in turnover rate, rebounding rate, and steal rate.
But is it enough to beat South Carolina? Maybe. The Tar Heels don’t have great size to match South Carolina. But they do have great length and speed. They’ll need to borrow Miami’s half court defensive strategy of packing the paint and denying entry passes. With all their length, the Heels could probably execute it even better than the Canes (yes that hurt my soul to write).
The issue is that UNC power forward Alyssa Ustby is listed at 6’1” and lanky, while SC power forward Aliyah Boston is every bit of 6’5” and built like Michelangelo made a sculpture for the basketball gods. Entry passes that make it to the post will force UNC to crash hard to block and a Gamecock big still might have room to finish over them. Perhaps one of the Tar Heel bigs—6’2” Anya Poole, 6’3” Malu Tshitenge, and 6’4” Alexandra Zelaya—can clean up mistakes with good help defense. But most one-on-one matchups in the post are going South Carolina’s way.
UNC could level the playing field by pressing South Carolina. UNC’s press defense rates out as excellent on Synergy, even though they have not used it often or at all in March Madness (0.382 ppp on 34 poss, 1.5% of time, 99th%). More importantly, South Carolina struggles mightily with breaking the press. The Gamecocks are in the 29th percentile for press offense according to Synergy (0.639 ppp on 133 poss, 5.7% of time). Teams have broken out presses when attempting upsets since forever and South Carolina has fallen victim to it already this post season. I would honestly be surprised if Courtney Banghart doesn’t at least try it.
On offense, I wish the Tar Heels the best of luck. Getting anything inside will be difficult, especially with Poole hopefully playing a big role. They aren’t a great three point shooting or transition team statistically, which are the great equalizers (along with the press). Although, the Heels have been better in transition in the tournament and have the speed to run more. UNC should also win the turnover battle if the stats hold up.
But here’s the rub: it’ll take nothing short of perfection offensively for UNC to win. Courtney Banghart is going to have to draw up some great plays, the Heels will have to hit from deep, and they’ll have to be deadly on the break. If they do all that, they may become the second team to crack 60 against the Gamecocks since January 9th. Of course, that team was Kentucky who stunned South Carolina in the SEC Championship game.
Prediction
I really really want to take North Carolina here for the chaos, for the ACC, and for the creation of a new elite team. I truly think they have a shot to win this one, especially if they can follow Miami’s defensive blueprint. But South Carolina has been too good and too resilient on defense to pick against. Courtney Banghart is a great coach who will do great things at UNC, but Dawn Staley has already done the great things and so has her team.
I think we see a renewed South Carolina offense with more kick outs and more made threes. But they’ll still rely on their defense and rebounding to take them to the Elite Eight over a valiant effort by North Carolina.
South Carolina 61 North Carolina 54