Dawn Staley got a big contract to come to South Carolina. Now, she and her women's basketball staff will get larger offices.
Athletics Department spokesman Steve Fink said Wednesday that South Carolina will renovate the Frank McGuire conference room at its practice facility for the volleyball program. The vacated space above will go to women's basketball.
The McGuire room had been used to hold major announcements.
The men's basketball offices for first-year coach Darrin Horn will also receive upgrades, although the space will remain the same. Staley, the former Temple coach, received a five-year contract with a total package worth $650,000 a season.
The construction is expected to be finished in time for the fall.
During his recent season “exit interview,” USC pitcher Sam Dyson told coach Ray Tanner he might want to pitch in a summer league. Tanner blanched. He was hesitant to let Dyson, in line to be his ace next season, put further strain on an arm that was surgically repaired last year.
Dyson sheepishly told Tanner that to play in the summer league, he needed his coach’s signature on a release form. Tanner smiled, and Dyson apparently got the message: take the summer off.
That signaled a small change in philosophy for Tanner, in what is emerging as a larger transition for his program.
Next season the Gamecocks will play in a new stadium, with a vastly different roster and an evolving coach. Tanner has been renowned for using his pitchers liberally, but this summer he has ordered Dyson and Blake Cooper, the two returning starting pitchers, to rest their arms.
“Is it going to be a hard-and-fast rule? Probably not,” Tanner said. “But I think there’s something to be said about pitchers with down time.”
USC’s men’s basketball coach Darrin Horn announced Wednesday that former walk-ons Branden Conrad and Robert Wilder have been awarded scholarships for the 2008-09 season. Both are guards and played sparingly last season, their first as Gamecocks.
The moves give USC 11 scholarship players for next season.
"Both Branden and Robert have been exemplary in everything that we have asked of them since we arrived on campus," Horn said in a statement. "Since we have some scholarships available, I felt that we should reward them while we can. They have earned it and they deserve it."
The move also should help the program’s Academic Progress Rate, assuming Conrad and Wilder continue to be good students. Walk-ons do not count toward a team’s APR, but as scholarship players, the pair can boost the team’s score.
It remains to be seen whether either player will receive more playing time.
Chris Fry created this group on SportProjections.com. 
