By Adam Brown
Sports Editor
adam.brown@hottytoddy.com
The Ole Miss men’s basketball team returns home on Saturday as they play host to the South Carolina Gamecocks. Tipoff is set for noon CT and can be seen on the SEC Network.
Ole Miss (10-14, 2-9 SEC) is coming off a 78-74 win over the Georgia Bulldogs on Tuesday night. The win over Georgia was the Rebels second win in league play.
Ole Miss was led on the floor by Jaemyn Brakefield with a career-high 24 points and Myles Burns added 20 points.
Coming off the first double-double of his career at Vanderbilt, Brakefield led Ole Miss with a career-high 24 points on 11-15 shooting, adding seven rebounds and tying his season-best with four assists. Burns loaded the box score with a season-high 20 points as well as six rebounds, an assist, two steals, and a block.
South Carolina enters Saturday’s game with a record of 8-16 overall and 1-10 in conference. They’ve picked up wins over South Carolina State, Clemson, USC Upstate, Georgetown, Presbyterian, Western Kentucky, Eastern Michigan, and Kentucky. They come to Oxford on an eight-game losing streak, having recently fallen to Arkansas by just two on February 4, and Missouri 83-74 on February 7. Their lone victory in SEC play against Kentucky came on the road, as they defeated the Wildcats 71-68 in Rupp Arena.
The Gamecocks rank sixth in the conference and 30th in the nation in offensive rebounds per game, averaging 12.4 per outing. They also rank in the top-100 in three-point attempts per game, averaging 23.9 shots from deep per game, the 88th-most in college basketball.
Their offense runs through highly touted freshman Gregory “GG” Jackson, as he ranks fifth in the SEC in points per game at a 16.1 average. He also ranks among the top-10 in conference in field goal attempts (358, No. 1 SEC and No. 33 NCAA), made field goals (141, No. 4 SEC), rebounds per game (6.5, No. 9 SEC), field goal percentage (39.4%, No. 9 SEC), and minutes per game (No. 9 SEC, 32:43).
Saturday will be the 46th time these two programs have met on the hardwood and the second this season. Back on January 17, the Rebels defeated the Gamecocks 70-58 in Columbia. Ole Miss leads the Rebels lead the all-time series 24-21, and are 6-4 over the last 10 meetings.
