CLEVELAND — A year after a stunning Final Four defeat that ended what could have been a perfect season and national championship run, the South Carolina Gamecocks finished the job Sunday in historic fashion.
South Carolina defeated 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 (6 times), Baylor (2011-12), Tennessee (1997-98) and Texas (1985-86) as the only programs to achieve such a feat.
With its third national title in seven tournaments and second in three seasons, South Carolina tied Baylor and Stanford for the third-most championships all time and cemented its status as women’s college basketball’s latest dynasty. Coach Dawn 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.
“It doesn’t always end like you want it to end, much like last year. But my [seniors from last season] are at the top of my heart because they wanted this. It’s awesome. …. It’s awesome. It’s awesome. It’s unbelievable,” Staley said. “When young people lock in and have a belief, and have a trust, and their parents have that same trust, this is what can happen. They made history. They etched their names in the history books.
The Gamecocks got the job done by knocking off Caitlin Clark, the presumptive No. 1 pick in next week’s WNBA draft, who ends her collegiate career with the most points in Division I men’s or women’s history with 3,951.
Iowa, which beat South Carolina in the national semifinal last year before losing to the LSU Tigers in the title game, fell short once more of its program-first national championship.
“I think the biggest thing is it’s really hard to win these things. I think I know that better than most people by now; to be so close twice really hurts,” Clark said.
Final Four Most Outstanding Player Kamilla Cardoso, expected to be an early pick in the draft, 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. The Gamecocks outrebounded the Hawkeyes 51-29 on the afternoon.
“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 somebody who went to the WNBA in our program. They send her off as a national champion. So this is history for us.”
South Carolina’s 2017 title-winning team had A’ja Wilson and its 2022 championship squad had Aliyah Boston, but its 2024 group was defined by its youth, depth and collective talent. The Gamecocks — who graduated 2023 No. 1 draft pick Boston and four other starters from last year — are 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 in the previous season.
South Carolina trailed early Sunday, falling behind by as many as 11 in the first quarter as Clark put up 18 points in that frame alone, the most by a player in any quarter of a championship game.
But the Gamecocks did what they do best and stormed back to hold the lead for over 20 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.
South Carolina built its game-high 14-point lead in the fourth behind a barrage of 3-pointers from junior Bree 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.
Although the Hawkeyes pulled within five with a little over four minutes to go, Iowa got no closer. Clark finished the game with 30 points on 10-for-28 shooting (5-for-13 from 3).
Three-point shooting wasn’t a trademark of the Gamecocks’ game last season, but their depth was, and it was on display once more Sunday as South Carolina’s bench 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. She joined former Gamecock Destanni Henderson (2022) as the only players to set their career high in a national championship game in the past 25 seasons.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
