Lamont Paris discusses South Carolina's offseason workouts
Lamont Paris jokes if there are 100 things he has to do as South Carolina’s head coach, only one or two of them will involve actually coaching basketball.
Between building a roster, handling player and alumni relations and the whirlwind that is the first few weeks on the job, it’s hard to get actual on-court time.
The Gamecocks now though are in the midst of summer workouts.
“We’ve only had a couple of workouts but I’ll tell you the energy has been great,” he said. “They’re want to improve is really high so far too. That’s been great to see. They’ve very enthusiastic.”
Summer workouts aren’t as intensive as a preseason or in-season practice, but they do give South Carolina’s staff a chance to work with the players on the roster. That’s important for a new staff trying to lay a foundation.
The transfer class enrolled a few weeks ago and the pair of freshmen—Zachary Davis and Daniel Sanford—arrived last week.
While these workouts do provide a little bit of evaluation time, the imperative thing is to develop guys and get them on the court together.
“I’m not trying to learn. In fact, I’m trying not to learn and evaluate yet. There will be a time for that. Really, more it’s bout building relationships and terminology and getting that out there,” Paris said.
“Then most importantly having guys interact with each other and learn how to play off each other. That’s the biggest part of our workouts.”
South Carolina is returning a handful of players from last year’s team but none who averaged more than 15.6 minutes.
The Gamecocks have to replace all five starters last season and the majority of the production on both ends of the floor.
“I looked at the film some. Honestly, there were 13 scholarship guys on the roster last year. The top seven or eight in terms of minutes and points are the ones who left. But these guys wanted to be here. It’s just a new, clean slate for them. There’s a lot of enthusiasm that comes with a fresh start,” he said.
“They all felt like their opportunity to make an impact on this program was improved with having a new roster and a new coach. That’s been reflected in the workouts. You can tell how positive they’ve been in the workouts.”
The Gamecocks still have two slots available for next year’s roster. They’ll continue offseason workouts now before preseason practice begins in October.
South Carolina is coming off an 18-win season with Paris tasked now with trying to get the Gamecocks back to the NCAA Tournament on a more frequent basis.
“It’s a challenge, no doubt about it. But I don’t think it’s something you can’t overcome. It’ll take some time to build it the way I want to build it. That’s been my M.O. throughout my career at every stop I’ve been at,” Paris said.
“But these first bricks we’ve laid in our foundation this year I’ve really like them. They’re great kids. They want to be better. They want to be coached in conjunction with the guys we do have here.”
