If a South Carolina fan was scripting the Gamecocks’ redemptive national championship game victory over the Iowa Hawkeyes, a key plot point likely would have been a made 3-pointer (or two or three) from Raven Johnson.
Johnson has been transparent about how what happened in last year’s Final Four game—the infamous wave off from Caitlin Clark—ignited her intention to improve. Since the season began, Johnson has fired away with confidence, hitting almost 37 percent of her 3-point attempts for the season. In the NCAA Tournament, she had been even better, making nearly 54 percent of her triples through the Final Four. And so, the perfect denouement for the Gamecocks’ revenge tour would have been Johnson draining one of her now-signature swish-twirl-kiss corner 3s, a dagger that delivered South Carolina another national title.
Instead, Johnson went empty from behind the arc on Sunday afternoon, an 0-for-4 performance. For the game, she managed only three points, making just one shot from the field. Yet, the missed shots did little to deter Johnson from her ultimate mission: shutting down Caitlin Clark.
While the story of Johnson’s season has been her offensive growth, she showed that her defense also should not be doubted. When guarded by Johnson, Clark, widely heralded as one of the greatest offensive forces in women’s college basketball history, managed just seven points, going 3-for-11 from the field when Johnson was her primary defender. The signature moment was Johnson’s late second quarter steal. With Clark sizing her up, waiting for the right second to step back into the final shot of the first half, Johnson swiped her dribble, recovered the ball and streaked to a wide-open layup, giving the Gamecocks the lead—and the momentum—at the break.
Johnson’s combination of strength, quickness and intelligence clearly bothered Clark, preventing her from finding an offensive flow. Clark is accustomed to having an advantage (or several advantages) over her defender. She is mostly unbothered by length, can overpower smaller, quicker players and create easy separation against defenders lacking foot speed. But, none of those avenues were accessible against Johnson—she kept running into dead ends. And eventually, Clark ran out of gas. Late in the fourth quarter, after Iowa had trimmed South Carolina’s double-digit advantage and was in striking distance, Clark nearly lost her dribble on multiple occasions and resorted to slinging some deep, desperation 3s, evidence of Johnson’s impact.
Yeah, offense might earn the shoe deals, the TV spots and the adulation of thousands. But, defense wins championships. And in large part because of Raven Johnson’s defense, South Carolina has another one.
And, she and the Gamecocks are not done. A junior who emerged as the team’s leader this season, Johnson returns to serve as the guiding light for a Gamecocks team that only loses Kamilla Cardoso, and gains Joyce Edwards and a few more top recruits. Sheer talent, however, is not the main reason why Johnson and the Gamecocks won it all on Sunday, nor why they might win it all again next year. Johnson and South Carolina epitomize all the gushy, good things we profess to love about sports: improvement, sacrifice, commitment, camaraderie, resiliency, will, want, attention to detail, drive, determination and more.
It’s a cocktail of clichés, but also the ingredients for revenge—and greatness.