Gamecocks rally late for tight win over LSU in 'game of runs' - ESPN

BATON ROUGE, La. — The South Carolina Gamecocks were on the brink. They trailed for nearly 33 minutes of Thursday's marquee matchup against No. 9 LSU in front of an antagonistic crowd of 13,205 clad in white t-shirts, animal print and sequins, hoping to see their defending national champion Tigers hand the nation's No. 1 team its first loss of the season.

But even with a new-look team following offseason graduation losses, South Carolina did what South Carolina has done time and time again. Capitalizing off 2023 Final Four Most Outstanding Player Angel Reese fouling out with 4:02 to play, the Gamecocks went on a 11-3 run to close the game and come away with a 76-70 victory, extending their undefeated season start.

South Carolina (18-0, the only remaining undefeated team in Division I) has now won 10 straight games when falling behind by double figures, the longest active streak in Division I and a run dating back to November 2021.

«It was a game of runs,» South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said. «They made big plays. We made big plays. The team that made the last play was the one that was going to win this basketball game.»

The win marked South Carolina's 28th-straight road victory, the longest such streak in SEC history and tied for the sixth-longest ever in DI, as well as their 37th-straight regular season conference win.

Even disappointed Tigers fans couldn't be too upset with the result given the thrill of the evening. Between the raucous crowd, the presence of ESPN's College GameDay and the contest's back-and-forth nature through the final minute, the environment «had all the dynamics of what you want every women's basketball player to experience,» Staley said.

LSU — which never led in the teams' sole matchup last