South Carolina’s Real Weapon Isn’t the 6-Foot-7 Forward — It’s the Guards Standing Next to Her

Everyone circling South Carolina‘s frontcourt this offseason keeps landing on the same name: Alicia Tournebize, the 6-foot-7 sophomore forward from Vichy, France, who joined the Gamecocks roster last season. She’s an easy story — a towering post player with shooting touch and shot-blocking instincts is always going to draw attention.

But buried lower on Dawn Staley’s roster sheet is a number that might matter more. South Carolina’s shortest listed guard for the 2026-27 season stands 6 feet tall. Not one guard on the roster checks in below that mark. And in a sport increasingly built around hunting the smallest defender on the floor, that absence is worth examining.

A Backcourt Without a Weak Link

South Carolina’s guard room for 2026-27 reads like this: Tessa Johnson (6-0, senior), Jordan Lee (6-0, junior), Jerzy Robinson (6-0, freshman), Ayla McDowell (6-1, sophomore), Agot Makeer (6-1, sophomore) and Justine Loubens (6-2, freshman), according to the program’s official roster. Six guards, and the floor is 6 feet even.

That’s a sharp departure from last season. South Carolina’s 2025-26 backcourt was anchored by Raven Johnson and Ta’Niya Latson, both listed at 5-foot-8. Johnson finished her career with two national championships, five Final Four appearances and SEC Defensive Player of the Year honors before the Indiana Fever selected her 10th overall in the 2026 WNBA Draft. Latson, the nation’s scoring leader before transferring in from Florida State, was drafted in the same class. Both are gone, along with post player Madina Okot.

Their departure reshapes more than the box score. Modern offenses are built to identify a defense’s smallest matchup, force a switch onto that player, and attack in isolation. When the shortest available body on a roster is 6-foot-0 instead of 5-foot-8, that particular exploit gets a lot harder to manufacture.

The Numbers Behind the Headlines

Jordan Lee’s move from Texas gives South Carolina a guard with defensive production to match her size. In her second season with the Longhorns, Lee averaged 13.2 points and 2.5 assists across 39 games, starting 38 of them, while racking up 59 steals and 20 blocks — an unusually high block total for a guard. Texas specifically flagged her ability to guard multiple positions when she signed with South Carolina.

Then there’s Agot Makeer, whose freshman NCAA Tournament run turned heads regardless of position. Across South Carolina’s six tournament games, Makeer averaged 14.0 points on 55.0 percent shooting, hit 46.2 percent of her threes, and tied for the team lead with 13 steals — good enough to earn a spot on the Sacramento Regional’s All-Tournament Team. At 6-1, she gives Staley another perimeter defender capable of contesting passing lanes that shorter guards simply can’t reach.

Those are the two clearest examples of what a taller backcourt could theoretically enable: length in passing lanes, recovery speed on closeouts, and — if Staley chooses to lean into it — more freedom to switch ball screens without immediately creating a size mismatch for the offense to exploit.

Where the Season Actually Sits

This isn’t a program searching for direction. South Carolina finished 2025-26 at 36-4, won the SEC regular season outright at 15-1, and reached the national championship game before falling to UCLA, 79-51. The Gamecocks closed the year ranked No. 2 in the final AP poll. Staley is heading into her 20th season having already built one of the sport’s most decorated programs; this backcourt shift is less about rebuilding an identity than about handing an established defensive culture a different toolkit.

The Caveat That Matters

Here’s where the analysis has to stay honest: height does not equal quickness, and a taller guard room doesn’t guarantee a more aggressive scheme. Lateral agility, screen navigation and foul discipline will determine how far Staley can actually push a switch-heavy defense — a smaller, faster guard can still turn a bigger defender in space, and nothing about a roster’s listed heights changes that on its own.

It’s also worth noting that South Carolina’s size at guard doesn’t exist in isolation from its frontcourt. Alicia Tournebize (6-7) and Adhel Tac (6-5) give Staley two players tall enough to survive some perimeter switches, alongside returning forwards Joyce Edwards, Ashlyn Watkins and Chloe Kitts, all listed at 6-2 or 6-3. Staley has leaned on oversized personnel before — the program has fielded standout post players throughout her tenure — but stretching that size down through every backcourt spot is a newer wrinkle, not a repeat of a previous formula.

What to Watch For

The realistic outcome probably isn’t a full switch-everything scheme applied to every possession against every opponent. It’s more likely that South Carolina’s size at guard becomes a situational weapon — a look Staley can turn to in late-game stretches, against certain matchups, or when she wants to take away an opponent’s first read on a ball screen without immediately conceding a mismatch.

Still, the structural fact is real: for the first time in recent memory, South Carolina doesn’t have an obvious small guard for an opposing offense to target. Whether that becomes a defining feature of this team or simply a nice bit of roster trivia will depend on how these six guards move their feet, not on how tall they’re listed. That’s the experiment worth watching once the season tips off.