BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — A day after Chloe Kitts announced her season-ending ACL tear on social media, South Carolina coach Dawn Staley took the podium at SEC basketball media days and said her plan was simple: It will be business as usual for the second-ranked Gamecocks.<\/p>\n
Staley traveled to Birmingham with sophomore forward Joyce Edwards, senior guard Ta\u2019Niya Latson and Kitts\u2019 media days replacement, junior guard Tessa Johnson. Their job this season?<\/p>\n
\u201cI just really need them to be themselves. Chloe is irreplaceable for what she brings so tangibly and intangibly,\u201d Staley said Tuesday. \u201cAll the players on our roster, with the exception of our two transfers and our freshman, they know what it\u2019s about.\u201d<\/p>\n
With or without Kitts, the Gamecocks were already facing significant turnover this year. Six letterwinners departed in the offseason, three of them starters who were selected in the 2025 WNBA Draft.<\/p>\n
The team is well prepared, welcoming two top freshman, Agot Makker and Ayla McDowell. Staley looked to the transfer portal and landed Florida State\u2019s Latson, the NCAA\u2019s leading scorer at 25.2 per game a year ago, and Mississippi State\u2019s Madina Okot, last season\u2019s SEC leader in shot percentage.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s not to say Staley doesn\u2019t have confidence in her returning players.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaryam (Dauda) is playing extremely well,\u201d Staley said. \u201cAdhel (Tac) is playing much improved. Joyce is Joyce. Joyce is probably going to take the brunt of it because she\u2019s just got more playing experience under us.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Gamecocks finished the 2024-25 season with a 35-4 record and a 82-59 loss to UConn in the NCAA Championship Game. Edwards led the team in points (494), averaging 12.7 points per game, the second-most by a freshman in program history.<\/p>\n
Edwards may take the brunt of it, but she understands the responsibility to replace an irreplaceable player falls on everyone.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt puts more pressure on the team,\u201d Edwards said. \u201cShe contributes something that everybody will have to contribute individually. So as a team, you have to come together collectively and fill the gap that she normally fills.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even without Kitts, the 2025 SEC Tournament MVP, Staley insists her team won\u2019t show sign of weakness.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re unafraid to go into the season without Chloe,\u201d Staley said. \u201cYou\u2019re not going to see us skipping a beat. Our players know anytime we sustain any kind of injury, we believe in the system that we put together. We believe in the players that we assembled.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — A day after Chloe Kitts announced her season-ending ACL tear on social media, South Carolina…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[402,398,400,401,99],"class_list":["post-225886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-basketball","tag-ncaabasketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}