re: Gamecock Men & Women 2023 Season Basketball Thread

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Winner: South Carolina's Paris makes case for Coach of the Year

South Carolina is one of the stories of the year in college basketball. The Gamecocks continued their hot start to SEC play by knocking off Georgia 72-62. South Carolina is now one game behind Alabama for first place in the SEC with a 7-2 record. This is a team that won four (total!!) conference games last season in Lamont Paris' first season at the helm.

Paris deserves some serious consideration for National Coach of the Year because South Carolina (pending a disaster in the final month of the season) will be in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2017 — when they went to the Final Four under coach Frank Martin. – Salerno

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Loser: Clemson's pain persists

Clemson's last three losses have come by a combined five points. On Saturday the Tigers fell 66-65 to Virginia when Jack Clark's potential game-winning 3-pointer bricked off the iron just before time expired. The Tigers did well to rally from a 12-point second half deficit but came up just short a week after their controversial one-point loss at Duke. Back on Jan. 16, they fell 93-90 in two overtimes against Georgia Tech. This team remains comfortably in the projected NCAA Tournament field for now. But at just 4-6 in ACC play, the Tigers are messing with mediocrity just as they have so often in recent years. — Cobb

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