USC repeats losing pattern; Wildcats scratch out victory

Kentucky 78, South Carolina 70

LEXINGTON, KY. — Billy Gillispie was seeing South Carolina in person for the first time. But he was able to astutely sum up the Gamecocks' season to date after just one viewing.

Kentucky's first-year coach said, even though he meant it as a compliment and not a slight, that USC is best defined by what it "could" do on the basketball court rather than what it actually does on it.

Another deflating episode took shape here Saturday afternoon, with South Carolina racing out to a seven-point lead after the half and then, again, fading down the stretch in a 78-70 Wildcats win inside sold-out Rupp Arena.

"This is a team that could win a lot of games," said Gillispie, who was about to use that word three more times to describe the close-but-not-enough feeling that's characterized three of USC's first five conference games.

The Gamecocks (9-10, 1-4 SEC) tussled but tumbled Jan. 9 at then-undefeated Vanderbilt, held a nine-point second-half lead Wednesday against Florida before falling and then were up as late as the 5:20 mark (63-62) Saturday against the Wildcats (9-9, 3-2).

"They could've won Wednesday night (against Florida)," Gillispie said. "They could've won at Vanderbilt. They could've won today."

Gillispie didn't include narrow non-conference defeats by North Carolina State, George Mason and UNC Asheville, but he could have.

Again and again, with the Arkansas and Providence wins as rare exceptions, the final minutes or moments prove too much for USC.

"It's like the same pattern," Gamecocks guard Zam Fredrick said. "We keep it close early, take the lead by seven or nine and somehow the other team will go on a spurt and find it and we'll go cold at the same time. It is kind of frustrating."

Saturday, a 14-0 run that included 12 straight points to start the second half put USC ahead 46-39 with 16:01 left.

After hitting 1 of 7 shots in the first half, Fredrick hit three of the 3-pointers in the run. Evka Baniulis, who had 12 points all on 3s, hit the other.

"We looked like we had a handle on the game," Gamecocks coach Dave Odom said.

But then things began to slowly unravel. Sophomore Dominique Archie picked up his fourth foul with 12:54 remaining and was relegated to the bench for the next eight minutes.

Kentucky, which has won all three of its home SEC games, chipped away until Derrick Jasper's 3-pointer with 4:49 left gave his team the lead for the first time since USC's big run.

The next four possessions defined the game for both teams.

South Carolina had five misses from its three most dependable shooters.

Meanwhile, for UK, Perry Stevenson hit a pair of free throws, Patrick Patterson had a strong inside move that Archie couldn't defend and Ramel Bradley buried a 3 that made it 72-64 with 44 seconds to go.

Patterson, whom Odom said is as good of a freshman post as he's seen at UK, had 22 points and nine rebounds. Bradley finished with a game-high 26 points and added 10 rebounds.

Unlike Wednesday against Florida, when Odom said his team didn't play smart, this was a matter of getting good shots and simply not making them.

Fredrick missed a 3. Archie missed two of the shots, a mid-range jumper and a 3-pointer. Devan Downey, who had a team-high 24 points and seven assists, did the same.

"We're just a few plays from winning these games," said Fredrick, who finished with 13 points. "We can go back as far as North Carolina State and George Mason. It's just a few plays, a few stops, from winning. It's not like we're getting blown out by 20."

A telling stat in the day is that South Carolina didn't attempt its first free throw until Downey finished an old-fashioned three-point play with 7:29 left in the game.

Kentucky hit 18 of 23 free throws. USC made 2 of 3.

Odom said foul shots should be a third of a team's offense. Saturday, it was 2.8 percent for a Gamecocks team that took 30 3-pointers and hit 12.

South Carolina hosts Georgia on Wednesday and then travels Saturday to Ole Miss.

Kentucky honored the retiring Odom at midcourt prior to the game. The school gave him a specialized bench chair.

Despite several close calls, including Saturday, Odom never beat Kentucky inside Rupp. This is the first time all year USC has dipped below .500 overall.

"It was a really tough loss for our team," Odom said. "Our team poured everything it had into this game."

Reach Travis Haney at thaney@postandcourier.com.