South Carolina women's basketball: With 15 players, how will Dawn Staley keep everyone involved?

South Carolina expects to have a full roster of 15 players for the 2026-27 season. It’s an unusual situation for the Gamecocks, who rarely carry a full roster. For an idea of how Dawn Staley will juggle playing time, we can look back to the 2021-22 season, the last time she had this many players.

Staley is on record saying that her preferred roster size is 12-13 players. There are several reasons she likes that number. 

Even deep teams only play about 10 players in a game. Playing more than that makes it hard for players to get into a rhythm. Women’s basketball teams practice against male practice players, so the players who aren’t part of the 10-woman rotation often don’t even get to practice.

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It’s hard to keep players happy when they aren’t playing or even practicing. In the NIL/rev share era, every player costs money. It becomes a budget issue of not only do we have money for players 14 and 15, but whether we should pay someone X amount of money to not play, or use that money to try to get a better starter.

(In most cases, the players who fill out the back end of the roster aren’t good enough to help you win a championship anyway. That isn’t the case in either of the two seasons we’re looking at, which may help explain the roster size.)

Due to a one-season waiver on roster limits, the 2021-22 team actually had 16 players. That included the Freshies, led by Aliyah Boston, in their junior seasons, and that season’s top-ranked signing class.

The 2026-27 Gamecocks also have veterans in seniors Chloe Kitts and Tessa Johnson, and junior Joyce Edwards. And they have to work in the nation’s second-ranked recruiting class and talented transfer Jordan Lee.

(Quick aside: We also have to acknowledge injuries. In 2021-22, LeLe Grissett missed the first 12 games due to injury, and Raven Johnson tore her ACL in the second game of the season. So Staley never actually had 16 players. 

For 2026-27, Ashlyn Watkins, Chloe Kitts, Kaeli Wynn, and Kelsi Andrews are all returning from major injuries. It is possible that one or more may not be at full strength to begin the season.)

In both cases, there are more players than minutes. But Staley made it work in 2021-22, and South Carolina won its second national championship. Before the first game of that season at NC State, Staley had a prophetic message for the Gamecocks.

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“This is what we said from the very beginning of the year: to make this a special year for us, we only need what you do best,” she said. “It is when you try to do stuff that someone is best at is going to get us in trouble.” 

Staley learned her lesson in the 2018-19 season. That season, she had 13 talented players, but few clearly defined roles. The result was South Carolina’s worst season since 2012. Staley vowed to make sure that in the future, she would clearly communicate with each player what her role would be. 

Fast forward to the 2022 Final Four. Everyone remembers Destanni Henderson’s performance in the championship game, but that overshadowed how Staley played the matchups.

Against Louisville’s small guards, Staley wanted to counter with size. 5-9 Zia Cooke only played 22 minutes, so that 6-1 Saniya Rivers could play 20 minutes. Staley wanted more shooting against UConn, so Rivers only played five minutes, while Cooke played 30 minutes and Bree Hall got 10. 

In both games, Staley didn’t play the five best individual players (for example, Kamilla Cardoso only played a total of 15 minutes). She played the five players that gave the Gamecocks the best matchup.

Before that season, Staley detailed how she explained it to the team.

“That’s why we ask our players, we only want what you do best,” Staley said. “We don’t want what you’re average at because what you’re average at, (for) somebody else, it’s their best. That is hard for players. It kind of puts the clamps on them a little bit, but with who we have, we have to play that way.”

Fans tend to treat the lineup like an all-star game; just put the five best (usually highest-scoring) players out there. But Staley’s philosophy is why Victaria Saxton, a player who was never one of the five most talented players but understood her role, was a three-year starter. 

It’s a two-way street. The coaching staff has to identify how to best use players. And players have to understand the role they are being given. They have all summer and fall to figure it out.

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