COLUMBIA — The season's over — a perfect 38-0, if anyone somehow needs reminding — but that wasn't stopping any fans of Gamecock women's basketball from packing Colonial Life Arena one more time.
A raucous and roaring crowd welcomed victorious coach Dawn Staley and her team back to Columbia April 8, fresh off their national title win in Cleveland less than a day earlier.
"We don't lose very many times in this place because of the environment that you all created," Staley told the crowd, who sold out five home games during the Gamecocks' 2023-24 campaign.
Columbia is awaiting another Main Street parade honoring the national champions, which will start at 2 p.m. April 14 at the corner of Main and Laurel streets, the city announced.
But nobody could hold off the party after the final buzzer sounded on the team's second championship in three seasons, with students storming the Thomas Cooper Library's fountain April 7 — now a bona fide tradition on campus.
Photos: Students celebrate Gamecock women's basketball win over Iowa for national champs
Thousands of fans stormed the Thomas Cooper fountain on the University of South Carolina's campus Sunday after the women's basketball team defeated Iowa to win the NCAA National Championship.
A student dons a Gamecock mascot head while sitting atop the shoulders of another in the Thomas Cooper Library's fountain. South Carolina's campus erupted when the school's women's basketball team defeated Iowa to win the national championship.
It was a homecoming for the Gamecock's "revenge tour," with the 75-68 win toppling much-acclaimed, Caitlin Clark-led Iowa after the Hawkeyes had ended USC's quest for a perfect season a year earlier in the Final Four.
"I just have to give it up to our players, who made a commitment to each other to probably do something that was different than every other team that I've coached," Staley said. "They held each other accountable, they encouraged each other ... each and every one of them took their turn in making an impact on any given night."
Such a full-team approach served USC well across the season and in the tournament's final, with freshman guard Tessa Johnson nailing 19 from the bench against Iowa.
There was "swag" about the team, Staley said, sometimes a little too much for the coaches to take — recounting a scene in Cleveland with her players using some "choice words" about what they were going to do to the Hawkeyes.
{div id=”qs-slideshow-overlay-qsi” class=”zfl-ss-overlay-qsi zfl-ss-overlay-qsi-nobg”}{div id=”qs-slideshow-overlay-qsi-caption” class=”zfl-ss-overlay-qsi-caption”}{div id=”qs-slideshow-overlay-qsi-caption-text” class=”zfl-ss-overlay-qsi-caption-text”}Students and fans celebrate the USC women’s NCAA Basketball Championship win over the Iowa Hawkeyes at Colonial Life Arena in Columbia on April 8, 2024.{/div}{/div}{/div}
"Meanwhile, the coaches are in the locker room, and we're like 'either, we're going to get blown out, or blow them out,'" she said. "And I'll say, for the first three minutes of the game, we got blown out. But the 37 other minutes?"
The crowd's explosion let her know what they thought about that game's ending — capped off with a 12-point lead.
USC Athletic Director Ray Tanner praised Staley as "the greatest of all time" to the frenzied crowd inside Colonial Life, who also recognized the team's practice squad — the only team to beat the women's team all season, Staley noted.
But perhaps the crowd's loudest roar of the afternoon came for sophomore guard Raven Johnson, who spent the season eyeing the rematch with Iowa and Clark.
"The revenge tour is over," Johnson declared. "Now it's time for the repeat tour."
