Frontcourt Leads Gamecocks to 80-54 Win Over Towson

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) – Collin Murray-Boyles scored 27 points, was a rebound shy of a double-double and led South Carolina to an 80-54 win over Towson on Tuesday night.

Murray-Boyles shot 9-of-12 from the floor an 9 of 10 from the line in leading the Gamecocks (2-1), who shot 50%. Jacobi Wright followed up a career high of 20 points against South Carolina State with 16 against the Tigers (1-2). Nick Pringle added 15 points and nine rebounds.

Nendah Tarke scored 12 points, Tyler Tejada 11 and Christian May 10 for Towson, which shot 30%.

South Carolina outscored Towson 12-3 to start the game with six points from Murray-Boyles and led thereafter, shooting 63% in the first half with 10 points each from Murray-Boyles and Pringle. The Gamecocks led 43-26 following a 15-8 run to end the half.

The Tigers didn’t get closer than 16 in the second half. Arden Conyers’ 3-pointer to finish the scoring gave the Gamecocks a 26-point winning margin, their largest lead of the game.

Both teams were in the mid-teens for turnovers but South Carolina led 19-9 in points off miscues.

KEY STAT

• The Gamecocks had 38 points in the paint tonight as the frontcourt of Collin Murray-Boyles (27 points) and Nick Pringle (15 points) combined 43 total points. They were a combined 15-of-20 (75.0 percent) from the floor.
• South Carolina shot 50.0 percent (26-of-52) overall as a team and improves to 8-0 under head coach Lamont Paris the last two seasons when shooting above 50.0 percent as a team.

NOTABLES

• The Gamecocks improve to 3-0 all-time over Towson with tonight’s victory, which was the first meeting between the two programs since Dec. 30, 1997.
• Senior Jacobi Wright had his third consecutive game in double figures with 16 points. He made a trio of 3s tonight and is shooting a team-leading 46.7 percent from distance thru three games. The team is 10-1 the last two seasons when he scores 10 or more points.
• Sophomore forward Collin Murray-Boyles nearly had his second-straight double-double, finishing with a season-high 27 points and nine rebounds. He went 9-of-12 from the floor tonight and is a combined 16-of-20 (80.0 percent) from the field the last two games.
• After scoring double-digit fastbreak points just five times in 2023-24, the Gamecocks have scored double-digit fastbreak points in each of the team’s first three games of the season. Carolina had 11 transition points tonight.

UP NEXT

The Gamecocks hit the road for the first time in 2024-25 with a trip north to Assembly Hall to face No. 16/16 Indiana (2-0) on Saturday. Tipoff is set for 3 p.m. (ET) on Peacock, Carolina’s debut on the streaming network. It’s the fourth all-time meeting between the schools and first at IU since Dec. 22, 1973.

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