The Make or Break series will tell us what we need to know about each SEC team by looking at the three most important non-conference games on each team’s schedule. Depending on the outcome, these three games could make OR break that team’s season because of the strengths it shows or weaknesses it could expose. This post features the South Carolina Gamecocks.

One must wonder if South Carolina coach Darrin Horn just swung by Gigi’s to fill out his non-conference schedule. Most of the mid-majors scheduled — including Southeastern Louisiana, Wofford, Presbyterian and South Carolina State — are predicted to struggle in their own conferences. (If you’re a smart RTC reader, you’d already know this thanks to our awesome Conference Primer series.) In games with preseason #1 North Carolina and preseason #3 Ohio State, USC will get a strength-of-schedule boost but will be heavy underdogs. With a slew of transfers and guard Bruce Ellington‘s availability for the team in question, don’t blame the Gamecocks for wanting to schedule lightly while they piece together a team that can compete in a much-stronger Southeastern Conference. Coach Horn’s team might need to rely on a hard-working defense during November and December while they learn who can score on a consistent basis. Then the team must hope Ellington can play major minutes when the SEC schedule starts up.

This is what Bruce Ellington looked like in a basketball jersey during last year's SEC Tournament. We won't see him looking like this again until probably the end of the Gamecocks' football season.

Three Four key non-conference games that will make or break the Gamecocks’ season:

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1. The Southeastern Conference’s official preseason media poll was released yesterday. You know what that means: Time for Nerdfightin‘! It is hard to argue against Kentucky being picked as the overwhelming favorite to win the conference championship. Receiving 18 (of 23 total) first-place votes, the Wildcats topped Vanderbilt (four first-place votes), Florida (one first-place vote) and Alabama (no first-place votes). South Carolina was voted the last place team.
2. Also ripe for your nitpickin’ and message board forum fighting: the media’s All-SEC Teams. Kentucky sophomore Terrence Jones was voted SEC Player of the Year and joins Vandy’s John Jenkins and Jeffery Taylor, Alabama’s JaMychal Green and Mississippi State’s Dee Bost on the First Team All-SEC list. Three more Kentucky players — senior Darius Miller, sophomore Doron Lamb and freshman Anthony Davis — join Vanderbilt’s Festus Ezeli and Florida’s Kenny Boynton and Erving Walker as members of the six-player Second Team All-SEC. CBSSports.com’s Gary Parrish threw the first nerdfight punch when he complained that Anthony Davis (like former Kentucky player John Wall before him) should be on the preseason First Team since Davis is arguably the most-talented player in the conference. We tend to agree and wonder why if there can be a six-member Second Team why there couldn’t be a six-member First Team?
3. Hope you didn’t miss our piece on Christian Laettner‘s appearance in Rupp Arena last night. Another player with more recent Kentucky history made an appearance during the Big Blue All-Stars exhibition game: Former Wildcat Enes Kanter. The Turkish-born Kanter was ruled ineligible by the NCAA for accepting benefits above an allowable amount while part of Turkish club team Fenerbahce. At last, Enes was freed, but his first game at Rupp was slightly underwhelming. Kanter looked out-of-sorts with the pace of the game and his NBA peers. Eager to involve the big man, All-Star teammate Rajon Rondo tried working with Kanter on several pick-and-roll plays; Kanter was surprised at the speed of Rondo’s bounce passes and lobs. Eventually Kanter settled into cleaning up offensive rebounds, made some mid-range jumpers and finished with 14 points and 10 boards. But his performance was not the kind of dominating debut Kentucky fans were hoping to see of the highly-sought big man.
4. Free Missouri! The school seemingly wants to join SEC Expansion 2011: ALL YOUR TEAMS ARE BELONG TO US. Though in a meeting of Big 12 presidents and athletic directors Monday evening, Mizzou did not formally withdraw from the conference. Interim Big 12 commissioner Chuck Neinas told the Kansas City Star that, “a strong desire for the University of Missouri to maintain its Big 12 affiliation was expressed” at the meeting. Yet when asked after the meeting about the Big 12, Missouri chancellor Brady Deaton said, “I wish them the best and all that. So we’ll see where that goes.” Sounds like where that is going is the SEC offices in Birmingham.
5. One of Missouri’s concerns about a move to the SEC is how it would affect Kansas City. The Big 12 will likely no longer hold its annual basketball tournament in KC. When Mizzou’s Board of Curators directed Brady Deaton to explore other conference options, they gave him explicit instructions to set up a holiday tournament for Kansas City. There is some pessimism regarding the success of a team-oriented tournament; ESPN’s Andy Katz wrote, “few power-six schools play in these non-exempt two-game tournaments anymore. … Most non-elite tournaments have shut down because of the difficulty of scheduling these games.” We think the next best option is to make a semi-home conference game in Kansas City with a familiar foe: Texas A&M. The two schools could promote the game as “The Battle for the Greener Pastures“.

Since 1992, former Duke forward Christian Laettner has been remembered in the dark recesses of every Kentucky fans’ heart. Beating The Unforgettables — the senior class of Wildcats who overachieved through Kentucky’s probation in the early 1990s — on a last-second shot created an entire generation of fans who harbor special hatred for Laettner and his stomp of Wildcat Aminu Timberlake’s chest.  After a decent pro career and some financial difficulties, Laettner re-engaged with Big Blue Nation Monday night. Laettner wanted to be hated; more specifically, Laettner wanted to get paid for being hated.

The Big Blue Hate Trade isn’t quite as profitable as former Wildcat basketball player Jeff Sheppard and his production team hoped. This Villains exhibition game was the ninth and final game of the Big Blue All-Star Tour that stretched throughout the state of Kentucky in the last couple of weeks. Laettner’s fame as Wildcat Enemy #1 was supposed to be the big pull to draw repeat attendees. Instead the announcement of Laettner’s involvement sparked some heated debate within Big Blue Nation as some fans did not want him a part of the festivities. Even after nearly 20 years since Laettner’s shot and Kentucky winning two National Championships of their own, it is still too soon for some Kentucky fans to let bygones be bygones.

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1. The LSU athletic department has a message for its basketball fans: A. B. C. Always. Be. Closing. LSU Athletics has partnered with adverCar, a marketing company that specializes in vehicle advertising. Participants can earn income from adverCar by having a decal attached to their personal vehicle containing an advertisement for the LSU basketball season. Perhaps former Tennessee Coach Bruce Pearl might be interested in getting Vols fans to apply car ad decals for his new line of recliner furniture.
2. The Tennessee squad themselves are going back to an old-fashioned method of training: hitting post players with brooms. A recent practice report highlighted assistant coach Jon Harris‘ use of a broom to help teach his post players how to score and adjust for taller defenders. If we hear of Harris conjuring comets as part of a fast-break drill, Tennessee might have a magical season ahead.
3. Another way to produce magic on the basketball court is to recruit some really talented freshmen. This season the Southeastern Conference has four representatives on the Wayman Tisdale Award preseason watch list. The award is given by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association to the nation’s top freshman at the end of the season. Florida guard Brad Beal joins a Kentucky threesome of Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and Marquis Teague on the watch list. Beal will need to crack a starting Gator rotation of experienced guards to be able to claim the award away from one of the Wildcats or the eight other non-SEC freshmen included on the watch list.
4. While Beal has to wait for his shot at the Wildcats in Rupp Arena, a former Gator is getting another shot to drive Big Blue fans crazy. Former Florida wing Corey Brewer joins a host of current and former NBA players as Villans to the Big Blue All Stars tonight in Rupp. The game is the marquee match-up for the traveling group of former Wildcat players that includes Enes Kanter, the Turkish big man who was ruled ineligible for NCAA competition last season. Brewer is the only SEC member of the Villains group; apparently Brewer’s former Florida teammate Joakim Noah is too busy with his training regimen to join the party.
5. Back in Gainesville, the sun shines bright on one old Kentucky foe. Florida coach Billy Donovan is expected to sign a contract extension that will lengthen his coaching tenure with the school for another five years. The new deal includes the two guaranteed years and the optional third year on his current contract, then adds an additional couple of years. Once he signs, Donovan will be locked in until the 2015-16 season — a twenty-year tenure at UF for a two-time National Championship winner. Donovan is worth every penny if he can lead Florida to a return appearance in the NCAA Elite Eight or better this season.

1. Rally the troops! Sound the Horn of Nerdfighting and CHARGE! The ESPN/USA Today Preseason Top-25 poll has been released! The Southeastern Conference has four members on the list: Kentucky at #2 (with one 1st place vote), Vanderbilt at #7, Florida at #10 and Alabama at #17. (Future SEC member Texas A&M checks in at #19.) Mississippi State was the only other SEC school receiving votes from the coaches.
2. Returning all five starters helped Vanderbilt garner their highest Preseason Top-25 ranking since 1965. Those 1965-66 Commodores, led by legendary coach Roy Skinner, were coming off their first NCAA Tournament Elite Eight appearance. This year’s Vanderbilt team has been upset in the past two NCAA Tournaments, leaving some observers to doubt their ability to make a serious run for the NCAA title. Others, such as CBS Sportsline’s Gary Parrish thinks Vandy had enough offensive talent and experience to advance further than the First Second Round. (Our very own Brian Joyce should soon have an interesting analysis of Vandy’s ability to succeed in the postseason. Keep yer eyes peeled!)
3. After many years of success and orange body paint, it seems strange not seeing Tennessee listed on this Preseason Top 25 list. Their omission is understandable: Hitting the reset button to expunge the Bruce Pearl era, new Volunteers head coach Cuonzo Martin faces a strong schedule with a hodge-podge of athletic players who don’t exactly fit his system. After many years of being the big hounds on the block, Vols fans will need to change to root for the underdogs of the SEC East. One way to start will be getting ticket sales back on track.
4. Mississippi State basketball fans have more to look forward to than a fitter Renardo Sidney and a team that has the potential to make all sort of noise come March. This is the 100th season of Bulldog basketball! (Please, don’t ring all your cowbells at once. It’s early.) The MSU Athletic Department has compiled a list of twenty All-Century team members: modern members include the versatile Mario Austin, incredible marksman Dontae’ Jones and swat-machines Jarvis Varnado and Erick Dampier. MSU fans can select the starting five from all these All-Century team members and the top five greatest games of Mississippi State history. Sounds like a fun start to a great year’s worth of events.
5. Early in the 2011-12 team practice season there still remains more questions than answers for South Carolina. With only nine scholarship players, Coach Darrin Horn admitted to the media on Wednesday that he has yet to find a starting five players for his team. Horn’s challenge, he says, is that he has seven players that could start on any given night. The USC blog Garnet and Black Attack has speculated on a regular starting rotation that includes improving sophomore center/forward Damontre Harris and highly-regarded freshmen shooting guard Damien Leonard. The Gamecocks are currently practicing without point guard Bruce Ellington as he finishes the season for the Gamecock football team. With Ellington’s role on the football team possibly increasing due to the season-ending injury to running back Marcus Lattimore, Coach Horn may not know how much he will be able to play Ellington once he rejoins the basketball team. Horn is currently encouraged by the offensive effectiveness he’s seen in practice thus far but reincorporating his only returning experienced scorer remains a mystery.

The Make or Break series will tell us what we need to know about each SEC team by looking at the three most important non-conference games on each team’s schedule. Depending on the outcome, these three games could make OR break that team’s season because of the strengths it shows or weaknesses it could expose. This post features the Florida Gators.

It took a little while to get the offense started on last year’s Florida team: The carburetor was flooded by too much of point guard Erving Walker. Several games into the season, coach Billy Donovan had to pop off the hood and tinker. Soon senior Chandler Parsons provided ignition sparks as the “point forward” and forward Vernon Macklin provided power with offensive rebounding. With Walker and guard Kenny Boynton free to explode from the perimeter, the offense propelled Florida into an Elite Eight appearance. Now that both Parsons and Macklin have graduated, Florida will need to find a new combination of their experienced guards and fresh faces to provide the offensive push. A tough conference schedule awaits the Gators in the SEC East; a fast start in the non-conference schedule will help the Gators race to a nice NCAA Tournament seed.

In his fifteenth season, Florida coach Billy Donovan knows when to drive and when to hire The Stig

Three key non-conference games that will make or break the Gators’ season:

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The massive amount of alumni, donors and fans of basketball science who support Kentucky care very much about mathematics. In particular, the accumulation of positive numbers.

Two years ago they celebrated being the first school to reach the number 2000 in basketball wins. A few days ago they cheered loudly as they unfurled the fourteenth colored banner allowed to decorate the huge research lab of Rupp Arena. The program also celebrated the three days worth of intense computation that resulted in an increment of Southeastern Conference Tournament titles.  While elated with the progress, none of these are the specific answer desired by Kentucky Math fans. They want the ultimate answer: An eighth NCAA National Championship.

Kentucky’s researchers were making incredible breakthroughs in the 1990s. Dr. Rick Pitino used several years of research in Full Court Pressology to finally solve for six. Before he could apply the same formula to solve for seven he left for a professional position for a storied firm in Boston. Dr. Tubby Smith immediately used many of Dr. Pitino’s components but mixed them with Intense Defense Limits stretching from one to suffocating. The result: Seven. As time passed Kentucky supporter’s error tolerance level was reduced to near-zero and Dr. Smith took his research to Minnesota. Dr. Billy Gillispie‘s early theories were promising but his science unsound.

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1. A dramatic turn in SEC Expansion 2011: ALL YOUR TEAMS ARE BELONG TO US! The New York Times’ Pete Thamel reported yesterday evening that Missouri‘s application to the SEC was “inevitable and imminent” according to an unnamed source close to the process. Thamel also reports that the SEC Presidents will accept Missouri’s application barring any legal problems that would complicate the school’s exit from the Big 12. (For the sanity of the nation, somebody please keep Baylor President Ken Starr from registering the domain name dontmesswithmissourifootball.com.) Missouri’s Board of Curators will be meeting later this week and may actually finalize an application to the SEC.
2. What has been the hold-up for Mizzou? An excellent article published last weekend by the Kansas City Star relates the differing opinions of Missouri’s conference alignment with the diverse population. The article does an excellent job of showing that Missourians’ identity is a mixture of sub-identities: the cowboys of the west plains, the farmers of the northern midwest, the traditionalists of the south and the big-city indifference from St. Louis. If each of these factions are represented on the Mizzou Board of Curators, then perhaps we finally understand why the school has been very deliberate in making its decision.
3. Vanderbilt’s Festus Ezeli should try being more deliberate when making travel decisions. Over the summer the senior center accepted a furnished meal and hotel room from a Vandy alumnus; a violation specified somewhere in the NCAA Huge Book O’ ByLaws. Vanderbilt Athletics self-reported the violation and he will sit out the Commodores’ first six regular season games. He will return for Vandy’s November 28 game versus Xavier. Vanderbilt’s Vice Chancellor David Williams said in a released statement that, “we have a very good compliance education process in place and this incident shows how easily someone can fall astray, even with the best intentions.” Remember, Vandy student-athletes: Don’t accept any illicit gifts, even if the gift is a near-mint copy of Detective Comics #27.
4. It’s pretty easy to deduce that the quote war between Kentucky head coach John Calipari and Louisville head coach Rick Pitino is nothing but a little hype from two coaches that don’t necessarily get along with each other. A Lexington-area sportscaster often jokes that Pitino and Calipari are acting like “a bunch of catty schoolgirls”. Yesterday, CBS Sportsline’s Gary Parrish believes he discovered a new layer of cattiness with the Wildcats head coach: The recent emphasis of the phrase “Players First Program” to describe Kentucky is to trump the Cardinal’s newest team phrase of “Louisville First.” We tend to disagree. Most of Coach Cal’s “Players First” talk was in direct build-up of his “State of the Wildcat Nation” speech. The emphasis about “Players First” was primarily given in sections of the speech written directly for the 2012 recruits attending and those who didn’t attend but would watch the highlights later. Additionally Calipari had no problem directly dissing Coach Pitino during his speech: He left out Pitino when referencing a list of former coaches and explicitly omitted the 1995-96 National Championship team (led then by Pitino) when listing some of the great Wildcat teams of the past. The coaches will probably not stop being snippy until the Cards and the Cats play on New Year’s Eve in Rupp Arena. Maybe we should take away their cell phones and ground them from going to the mall until the game.
5. Full team practices launched over the weekend. Check out my homeboy Brian Joyce’s SEC Practice Report from yesterday for a detailed look. Bryan ran out of time before he could preview Alabama. ‘Bama is returning one of the most powerful and experienced frontcourts in the nation which includes senior forward JaMychal Green and junior forward Tony Mitchell. Last season the Crimson Tide struggled to find consistent shooting from deep. (Last season only then-senior guard Charvez Davis made more than 40 three-pointers in the season [71].) The additions of freshmen Trevor Lacey, Levi Randolph and Rodney Cooper will more than make up for Davis’ departure due to graduation. In an interview after ‘Bama’s first practice Green said, “I think we’re a better scoring team. We’ve got better 3-point shooters this year. We have more than one.” If head coach Anthony Grant can find multiple consistent deep threats from his freshmen, they will spread out defenses and let Green and Mitchell feast in the middle. Mmmmmmm… post-up play.

1. With RTC expanding our coverage of the SEC, we should lead off with news about the SEC Expansion 2011: ALL YOUR TEAMS ARE BELONG TO US! The Southeastern Conference has developed a transition team that is working out the details to squeeze Texas A&M into the 2012-13 season. (Does anybody have a roll-away bed the Aggies can borrow?) The transition team is still working out the football scheduling, trying to find a way to balance Texas A&M’s schedule across the conference divisions while maintaining competitive balance. Not much has been released in respect to the basketball schedule yet. A few weeks ago Vanderbilt’s Kevin Stallings told ESPN’s Andy Katz that a 13-team schedule will likely involve each team playing each other once and several protected in-conference rivalry games.
2. It might be easier to manage the basketball schedule if there were an even number of SEC teams. A nice number like… fourteen, perhaps? Nothing official has been announced regarding the next member, though that hasn’t stopped rampant speculation. Missouri is still trying to decide whether it wants to leave the Big 12 or stay; either way, the school won’t be able to change conferences until 2013 at the earliest. There also is reportedly some problems with how Missouri would fit within the football East/West division: Alabama would prefer Missouri to be in the East division so that the football divisional rivalries can be protected. By this time next week, another school might be the hot new name for the SEC’s fourteenth school. (We’d love to see your suggestion for the fourteenth SEC school in the comments.)
3. Best wishes to Texas A&M coach Billy Kennedy as he takes a medical leave from the team. The Aggies will be led by assistant head coach Glynn Cyprien, a former Kentucky assistant in the Billy Gillispie Era. Coach Cyp was well-respected during his time in Lexington and should be able to give Coach Kennedy all the time he needs to recover.
4. The Post-Gillispie Era at Kentucky has been headlined by coach John Calipari and his line of extraordinary point guards, including former Kentucky guards John Wall and Brandon Knight. The Courier-Journal’s Rick Bozich writes about how freshman guard Marquis Teague is rising to the challenge of being “the next” Calipari point guard and all the comparisons to Wall, Knight, Derrick Rose and others. Teague’s ability to quickly master his role in the Wildcats’ offense will be crucial for the team’s early tilts against North Carolina and Kansas.
5. Mississippi State’s Renardo Sidney put in work with former NBA player John Lucas over the summer to improve his conditioning and attitude. This commitment to improvement has seemingly paid off; he is now meeting expectations in his conditioning drills with the Bulldogs. Head coach Rick Stansbury told the Clarion-Ledger‘s Brandon Marcello that Sidney’s attitude has also improved: “We haven’t had any blow ups… Call it maturity, call it whatever you want to call it; that’s what we want. I don’t care what you call it. That’s what we expect and need from him.” We call it “we’ll believe it when we see it”, and then we’ll call it “bad news for the rest of the SEC.”