South Carolina women's basketball: Former Gamecocks shine in Las Vegas-Atlanta game

In the waning seconds of Sunday’s 85-84 game between Las Vegas and Atlanta, former Duke star Chelsea Gray made the go-ahead basket and then the clinching steal. The rest of the game, however, was a showcase for former Gamecocks.

The A’ja Wilson Foundation sponsored a sold-out bus trip to Atlanta to see its namesake. Wilson wasn’t able to duplicate her record-setting 45-point performance from Friday night, but she still put on a show.

Wilson scored 20 points and added six rebounds and two blocks. In the first half, she passed her coach Becky Hammon for 19th place on the WNBA’s career scoring list.

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“She can play all spots,” Hammon said. “We run her off some guard actions, she can do that. We can put her on the block, she can do that. We can put her in the midrange game, and she can do that.”

It was the Atlanta Gamecocks who put on a show, helping the Dream erase a 19-point second-half deficit before Gray’s heroics.

Allisha Gray led all scorers with 25 points. She finished one rebound shy of a double-double and moved into fifth on the Dream’s career assists list. That kind of game isn’t a surprise for Gray – she was averaging 25.0 points so far this season and finished fourth in the MVP voting last year.

Gray’s young Gamecock teammates put on a show.

Te-Hina Paopao got her first start of the season in place of injured Rhyne Howard. She scored a career-high 19 points and went 4-9 from three. Paopao entered the game 0-7 from behind the arc this season, but she swished her first three to break out of the slump. 

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The rest of the Dream went just 1-14 from three (of course, Allisha Gray had the only make).

Rookie Madina Okot came off the bench and contributed her first career double-double in just 16 minutes. Okot got a welcome to the WNBA moment early, when Wilson left her flat-footed for a three-point play, but Okot quickly adapted.

Okot finished with 14 points and a game-high 11 rebounds, both career-highs. She also had a key block during Atlanta’s fourth-quarter comeback.

NEW! Message board for South Carolina Women’s Basketball!