Charles Nailen/The Hoya Georgetown relied on defense to move them past South Carolina last night at MCI Center.

The Georgetown men’s basketball team faced its first test of the season last night in a battle with South Carolina. With a 67-59 win, the Hoyas passed. But some inconsistencies down the stretch made the game a little closer than Hoya fans probably would have liked.

A strong defensive performance outshone the Hoyas’ weaker points: getting in foul trouble, junior forward Mike Sweetney’s 12-of-24 shooting performance, getting out-rebounded and shooting 4-of-14 from three-point land. Sweetney’s double-double (27 points and 11 rebounds) led the Hoyas.

Georgetown (5-0) got out to a 16-5 lead after six minutes of play, in which the Hoyas foced six South Carolina (4-1) turnovers.

But the Gamecocks kept the play even, out-rebounding the Hoyas 28-19 in the first half. Sweetney was held to a 6-14 mark from the floor, but most of the misses couldn’t be attributed to Gamecock defense. Numerous shots in the paint that are usually no-brainers for Sweetney just did not fall.

“I thought I could have made a lot of the shots that I missed,” Sweetney said.

In addition, the Hoyas had 10 fouls with 3:24 left to go in the half. South Carolina produced five points on subsequent freethrows, and the half ended with the Hoyas up just 31-29.

After the break, the Hoyas set out slowly building back their lead. But it took them 13 and a half minutes to get up by eight. With 6:30 to go, the Hoyas took a timeout. When play resumed, senior forward Victor Samnick fouled Gamecock Kerbrell Brown outside the three-point line, and Brown sunk all three free-throws. Senior forward Courtland Freeman committed another quick foul to send a Gamecock to the line, and before the Hoyas knew it, they were down by three with 5:38 to go.

But the Hoyas got two defensive stops next, and freshman guard Ashanti Cook nailed a big three-pointer to put the Hoyas ahead for good.

“Ashanti Cook’s three-pointer was a dagger in the hearts of South Carolina,” Head Coach Craig Esherick said.

“We just needed to make sure we ended the game strong, because that was something that we wanted to focus on because last year we lost a lot of close games,” co-captain Freeman said. “It reminded us [of that].”

The game was the first the Hoyas have played against a major-conference opponent. South Carolina, which competes in the Southeastern Conference (SEC) was 4-0 heading into the game. Prior to last night’s contest, the Hoyas had handily beaten Grambling, James Madison, Towson and Coastal Carolina.

“It added a little bit of pressure,” Freeman said of the upgrade in competiton.

Junior swingman Gerald Riley thought the win added some legitimacy to the Hoyas’ unbeaten record. “For all those people who were saying that we weren’t playing nobody, we beat South Carolina tonight, so that shows people that we’re here to play. So if they’re second-guessing us, they shouldn’t be,” he said.

South Carolina’s leading scorer and SEC player of the week Chuck Eidson, who was averaging 18 points per game before last night, was held to just two points on 1-for-4 shooting. He also committed eight turnovers. Esherick said that his strategy for defending Eidson was paying extra attention to him as well as using different defenders.

With Eidson limited, the Gamecocks were instead lead by sophomore forward Carlos Powell, who scored 18 points. Brown chipped in 17 and six boards.

The Hoyas’ strongest offensive production came from their frontcourt. They had 32 points in the paint, while South Carolina had just 12. Despite Sweetney’s shooting woes, he still appeared to dominate the Gamecock defense. Both he and senior forward Wesley Wilson had several impressive dunks in the game.

Both teams applied a full-court press for the majority of the game. The Hoyas stuck with their typical man-to-man defense and the same starting lineup that Esherick had used in the first four games.

Junior forward Gerald Riley dove for a loose ball in the first half and chipped one of his front teeth. The part of the tooth that was broken off was retrieved, Riley said.

The snowy weather limited last night’s attendance to just 5,469. However, an extraordinary number of NBA scouts did make the trip.

The Hoyas go on an 11-day break before facing Norfolk State at CI Center on Dec. 16.