Giving up points in the paint plagued Texas A&M’s first conference game against No. 1 South Carolina on Dec. 29 on the road in Columbia, S.C. which resulted in a 76-34 loss.
Within the first four seconds of the first quarter, junior guard Kay Kay Green committed a personal foul on senior Gamecock guard Zia Cooke, the first of many throughout the match. Aggie fans nervously looked on as Cooke proceeded to make one of two of the given free-throws.
Gamecocks coach Dawn Staley paced back and forth along her portion of the court with heated emotion, due to the score that kept the Fightin’ Farmers in the game.
Inside the five-minute mark of the second quarter, the Aggies turned over the ball twice within a 10 second period from graduate forward Aaliyah Patty and freshman guard Mya Petticord. A minute later a third turnover appeared on the court from sophomore forward Jada Malone. To add fuel to the fire, one minute and six minutes remained on the game clock, and South Carolina was 6-0 for over nearly a minute and a half.
Junior A&M guard Sahara Jones made two free-throws from fouls given up by redshirt freshman South Carolina guard Raven Johnson to make the score 43-18. As a cherry on top of a scrambled first-half Aggie performance, the clock struck zero to end the first half, and as it did, Cooke put up a defensive rebound — her first of the half.
The Aggie offense suffered a scoring drought for over eight minutes of a 10 minute quarter, as well as managing three turnovers within the same time period. The garnet and black had a two-minute scoring drought within the maroon and white’s lengthy scoring scarcity.
“We tell our team all the time, you can do hard things,” Taylor told 12thMan.com.
Within the second half of play, Canadian international and Gamecock senior forward Laeticia Amihere shot and made both free-throws given up by Petticord.
Freshman guard Talaysia Cooper made a layup and got to step up for a free-throw in the same play. Unfortunately for Cooper, her shot missed the basket.
Aggie first-year head coach Joni Taylor argued with the referee over a foul with just over four minutes remaining in the game, but Taylor failed to turn over the foul called on her player, Malone.
“I’m looking forward to how we respond to this,” Taylor told 12thMan.com.
A&M women’s basketball will return to play on Monday, Jan. 1 at 1 p.m. in Reed Arena against the Florida Gators. Tip-off is set for 1 p.m. and will be the Aggies’ second-to-last match in the Holiday Hoops lineup.
