Putting South Carolina's national championship into perspective
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For the third time in program history, South Carolina women’s basketball are national champions after holding off Iowa 87-75 on Sunday.
Replacing an entire starting lineup from a year ago, the Gamecocks not only reloaded but re-wrote the record books in the process. Below are a few facts to put this the 2023-24 season into perspective, as well as some facts about their game against Iowa.
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– Finishing the season (38-0), South Carolina becomes just the tenth team in women’s basketball history to finish a season undefeated. USC becomes the first team since the 2015-16 UConn Huskies to achieve the feat.
- 2015-16 UConn (38-0)
- 2013-14 UConn (40-0)
- 2011-12 Baylor (40-0)
- 2009-10 UConn (39-0)
- 2008-09 UConn (39-0)
- 2001-02 UConn (39-0)
- 1997-98 Tennessee (39-0)
- 1994-95 UConn (35-0)
- 1985-86 Texas (34-0)
– Dawn Staley becomes just the fifth coach in women’s basketball history to win three national championships. She joins Geno Auriemma (11), Pat Summit (8), Kim Mulkey (4), and Tara Vanderveer (3).
– In the past four years, South Carolina has gone (135-8). No other team has more than 122 wins in that span.
– The Gamecocks have won more national titles (2) and have reached the most Final Fours (4) in the past four seasons. That’s the most by any team in the nation. They’ve also outscored their opponents by 24 points in that span, which also ranks first.
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– In what was her final collegiate game, Kamilla Cardoso finished with 15 pts, 17 reb, and 3 blk. This marked just the third time in her career that she scored at least 15 points and had 15 rebounds in the same game. The other two times both also happened this season (2/18/24 vs Georgia and 11/6/23 vs Notre Dame).
– Entering Sunday’s game, Iowa was ranked No.1 in the country for points per game (91.4). In the national championship, the Gamecocks held the Hawkeyes to 75 points, marking just the sixth time this season Iowa didn’t crack at least 76 points.
