TAMPA, Fla. — Bree Hall was a bundle of nerves before her first national championship game.
Hall, then a freshman, said she took a melatonin supplement to drift into a restful sleep in Minneapolis because she was so scared the night before South Carolina beat UConn to win the 2022 NCAA Championship.
But last night? The senior guard said she’d sleep just fine before the No. 1 seed Gamecocks’ (35-3) rematch with No. 2 seed UConn (36-3) in the 2025 national championship game Sunday (3 p.m. ET, ABC) at Amalie Arena.
Hall is confident now. She’s a leader, and she embraces the role she knows she has to play for the Gamecocks to become the first repeat national champions since UConn in 2016. She’s ‘laser-focused on winning’ and accomplishing the goal her team fell short of in 2023.
Hall knows she doesn’t have the luxury of being a background figure in this title game. She can’t just play defense and feel like she did enough. She has to look to score, and she has to communicate consistently.
‘From the 2023 season to this season, I feel it’s just going to be those little things that’s really going to matter,’ Hall said Saturday during a media day ahead of the women’s NCAA Tournament final.
Hall and fellow seniors Raven Johnson and Sania Feagin are on the cusp of becoming the most decorated class in program history. They’ve already won two national championships in 2022 and 2024, and this year they’re prepared to complete their quest for three.
The trio have been at the core of South Carolina making five consecutive trips to the Final Four, a feat only UConn and Stanford have achieved.
South Carolina coach Dawn Staley called the seniors who spent their entire careers on her team the epitome of sacrifice. They embraced the path she put before them and didn’t transfer when they didn’t play heavy minutes as underclassmen.
‘They’re winners … They’re playing the biggest role for us in this championship run,’ Staley said. ‘The way they just sacrifice and held out, and now they position themselves to do something that very few classes are able to do – and that’s try to win a third.’
South Carolina is only the 13th reigning NCAA champion to return to the title game the following season. USC, Tennessee and UConn are the only teams to win consecutive championships in NCAA history.
The last reigning champion to return to the title game was Notre Dame in 2019 – which is also the last time the women’s Final Four was hosted in Tampa. The Fighting Irish lost to Baylor.
Adding a repeat to South Carolina’s growing dynasty would mean a lot to Johnson, not only because that’s what she came to the program to do, but because of all the players who came before her.
Players like Aliyah Boston and Zia Cooke, who led them to the 2022 championship and taught Hall, Johnson and Feagin what it meant to be veterans. South Carolina legend A’ja Wilson, who led the school to its first national title in 2017, and the late Nikki McCray, who was an assistant coach in 2017.
‘We’re playing for others,’ Johnson said. ‘This history would mean a lot for us, for our recruiting class. It means a lot, honestly, and I don’t think we understand how much this will mean for us.’
Johnson told Staley during her college recruiting process that she wanted to come to South Carolina to win championships. She worked to convince other players in her class to commit to the Gamecocks with her, so much so that Staley called Johnson the conductor of her recruiting class.
She’d ask Staley who else the staff was recruiting and get to work. Sometimes Johnson even knew someone was committing before Staley. That’s how dedicated Johnson was to bringing the right people with her, how serious she was about winning. Johnson won championships in high school, and she expected to keep on winning them in college.
‘You’re thinking an 18, 17-year-old young person, really doesn’t know what she’s saying,’ Staley said. ‘I went with it in the moment because in recruiting, you want to believe young people. And I’ll be damned if it ain’t come true that she’s got championships on her resumé. She’s putting us in a position of winning a third in her class, which is quite incredible.’
