'Unbeatable': Staley, Gamecocks (38-0) win crown

CLEVELAND — Soon after the national championship trophy was presented to the South Carolina Gamecocks, coach Dawn Staley threw her head back and, with confetti showering down, spread her arms toward the sky.

A year after a stunning Final Four defeat that ended what could have been a perfect season and national championship run, South Carolina finished the job Sunday in Cleveland — and did so in historic fashion.

The Gamecocks vanquished the Iowa Hawkeyes 87-75 in the women’s NCAA tournament title game to become the 10th team in Division I history to complete an undefeated season (38-0), joining UConn (six times), Baylor (2011-12), Tennessee (1997-98) and Texas (1985-86) as the only programs to achieve such a feat.

“We’re unbeatable,” junior Bree Hall said. “That’s the statement that was made tonight.”

After graduating 2023 No. 1 WNBA draft pick Aliyah Boston and four other starters from last year, South Carolina became the first team since at least 2000 to win a title after returning none of its primary starters from a team that reached the Final Four the previous season.

“They made history,” Staley, overcome with emotion, told ESPN’s Holly Rowe. “They etched their names in the history books when this is the unlikeliest group to do it.

“When [God] closes a door, he opens up a door that’s giving you unimaginable success.”

With its third national title in seven tournaments and second in three seasons — including a 109-3 record in that span — South Carolina tied Baylor and Stanford for the third-most championships ever and cemented its status as women’s college basketball’s newest dynasty, one that won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. Staley — a former two-time Player of the Year who played in three Final Fours but missed out on a championship herself — became the fifth head coach to win at least three national titles.

To clinch history, the Gamecocks defeated the team that ended their season last year in Iowa and Caitlin Clark, the presumptive No. 1 pick in next week’s WNBA draft.

Clark ended her collegiate career with the most points in Division I men’s or women’s history at 3,951. Staley thanked Clark during the postgame ceremony for her contributions to the sport, saying, “You are one of the GOATs of our game, and we appreciate you.”

Iowa, which beat South Carolina in the national semifinal last year before losing to the LSU Tigers in the title game, once more fell short of its first national championship.

“The biggest thing is it’s really hard to win these things,” Clark said. “I think I know that better than most people by now. To be so close twice really hurts.”

Final Four Most Outstanding Player Kamilla Cardoso finished with 15 points and a career-high 17 boards, becoming the fifth player with at least 15 points and 15 rebounds in a championship game in the past 25 seasons. Having already announced she is entering the draft, where she is expected to be an early pick, Cardoso is the only major contributor for South Carolina who won’t return next season.

“Kamilla Cardoso was not going to let us lose a game in the NCAA tournament,” Staley said. “She played through an injury, she played like one of the top picks in the WNBA draft and her teammates did something that no teammates have done for anybody who went to the WNBA in our program. They send her off as a national champion. So this is history for us.”

With Cardoso’s help, the Gamecocks outrebounded the Hawkeyes 51-29 on the afternoon, using those opportunities to score 30 second-chance points.

South Carolina’s 2017 title-winning team had then-junior A’ja Wilson and its 2022 championship squad had then-junior Boston. But its 2024 group was defined by its youth, depth and collective talent, the sum proving greater than its parts, though the parts were plenty strong themselves.

“We’ve come a long way,” transfer Te-Hina Paopao said. “It’s been a long journey. We’ve trusted each other so much over the season. We have so much confidence with each other, so much love. … We genuinely love to be with each other. We genuinely want to see everyone succeed. It’s been a great journey and to cap it off with a perfect season, it’s just a blessing.”

The win Sunday was a catharsis, not just for Staley but for the program and its alums, a completion of its “revenge tour” that sophomore Raven Johnson was the face of after Clark had waved her off and left her unguarded from the 3-point line in last year’s matchup.

Johnson took over as the primary defender on Clark after a hot start that saw her score 18 points in the first quarter. Johnson held the two-time Player of the Year to 3-for-11 shooting (seven points) and forced four turnovers. In all, Clark finished with 30 points on 10-for-28 shooting (5-for-13 from 3), but only 12 in the game’s final 30 minutes.

“It doesn’t always end like you want it to end, much like last year,” Staley said. “But my [seniors from last season] are at the top of my heart because they wanted this. And I hope we can erase whatever pain they had, last year experiencing not being able to finish it here.

“It’s awesome. It’s unbelievable.”

South Carolina trailed early Sunday, falling behind by as many as 11 in the first quarter as Clark put up the most points by a player in any quarter of a women’s championship game.

But the Gamecocks did what they do best and stormed back to hold the lead for over 21 minutes, including the entire second half. They extended their streak of winning games when having trailed by 10-plus points to 11, the longest active one in Division I, and became the first team to win the national championship game by at least 10 points after trailing by 10 points.

South Carolina went into the break up 49-46 and built its game-high 14-point lead in the fourth behind a barrage of 3-pointers from Hall and freshman Tessa Johnson, a marked difference from the meeting against Iowa last year when the Gamecocks hit just 4 of 20 shots from beyond the arc. They finished 8-for-19 from 3 on Sunday, and when they weren’t getting it done from there, they got it inside, managing 48 points in the paint.

Although the Hawkeyes pulled within five with a little over four minutes to go, Iowa got no closer.

Of South Carolina’s 38 wins this season, 31, including Sunday’s, were by double figures.

Three-point shooting wasn’t a trademark of the Gamecocks, but their depth was, and it was on display once more Sunday as South Carolina’s backups outscored Iowa’s 37-0, the most bench scoring for any team in a championship game since at least 2000.

That effort was led by freshman guard Johnson with a career-high 19 points, the fourth freshman in the past 25 seasons to lead her team in scoring in a national title game. She joined former Gamecock Destanni Henderson (2022) as the only players to set their career highs in a national championship game in the past 25 seasons.

“They’ve done so much for this team,” Paopao said of the bench. “A lot of people sleep on them. But they could start on any team in this country, but they decided to sacrifice that and play for this team and win a national championship, which we did today.”

ESPN Stats & Information contributed to this report.