Rock Hill’s DJ Burns among South Carolina natives helping Winthrop reach NCAA dreams

DJ Burns was unusually quiet.

Winthrop’s big man from Rock Hill — the highest ranked recruit out of high school to ever land in the Eagles’ program — is usually gregarious and light-hearted. He smiles and screams on the court, dances and tosses towels on the sideline.

But before the Big South tournament championship Sunday at the Winthrop Coliseum — a game which the Eagles dominated and which delivered them their 13th Big South title — the 6-foot-9, 276-pound big man wasn’t himself.

Head coach Pat Kelsey could tell.

“It was right before the game,” Burns said after the game. “I was going back — and I don’t usually do this, I think that’s why (Kelsey) noticed it — and I was looking over the scout. Trying to make sure I was locked in completely. I didn’t want to leave any regrets coming off the court. So I was just going back and I’m looking at all the players, even the guards.”

Kelsey then approached his big man and gave him one message, Burns said: “You seem a little tense. Just relax and go out there and play and have fun.”

You don’t need to tell Burns twice.

The York Preparatory Academy alum, who initially went to Tennessee before transferring back home, put on perhaps his best performance in a Winthrop uniform Sunday. The redshirt sophomore led all scorers with 22 points on 11-of-12 shooting, sustaining Winthrop’s tenuous lead in the first half and blowing it open in the second. He even furnished the game’s two daggers — a bucket on Winthrop’s last possession of the first half, which saw him back down a defender from the 3-point line and bury a hook shot from the free-throw line, and a dunk on a key Winthrop possession late in the second half that seemed to finally stuff Campbell’s final run at a Big South title.

“My team had a lot of trust in me,” Burns said.

South Carolina products thrive

Traditionally a football state, S.C.’s basketball scene has been on the come-up recently, what with Ja Morant, who went to Crestwood High in Sumter, and Zion Williamson, from Spartanburg Day, being two of the best young talents in the NBA..

Several of SC’s best high school hoopers in the last few years, in fact, have landed at Winthrop, and they’ve proven integral on this championship team.

There’s Burns, of course, who gives Winthrop the luxury of an inside scoring threat — an invaluable tool come postseason play and a rarity for Big South teams.

But there’s more.

There’s freshman Kelton Talford from Great Falls. He scored six points in 15 minutes on 3-for-3 shooting Sunday. (He’s only lost one game he’s played in since the end of his junior year of high school — and that came against UNC Asheville in late January.)

There’s sophomore Chase Claxton of Greenville, arguably Winthrop’s best defender. He took a two charges Sunday.

There’s sophomore Russell Jones Jr. of Blythewood, the 5-foot-8 bulldog and 2020 4A South Carolina Player of the Year from Westwood High. Jones scored seven points and added an assist and two rebounds.

Senior guard Keyshawn Johnson is from Charleston, too, and Winthrop signee and high school senior Ben Burnham is from the Fort Mill area.

Recruiting from South Carolina has been a focus for Kelsey, the coach said postgame. It’s not only beneficial because South Carolina basketball is “booming” with talent, but also recruiting in-state has instrumental benefits, too, like building an in-state brand.

“South Carolina basketball has really been on the come up, and we want to own our bread basket,” Kelsey said. “And you know, we’re going to try to find special, advanced-type players as we call them anywhere in the world that we need to go. They gotta have the intangibles that we look for, they gotta have the drive, the competitiveness, the toughness, and if we have to go to Australia (Kyle Zunic), if we have to go to Italy (Micheal Anumba), we’ll do that, but it’s nice when you can go into your backyard and have those types of players. And we have them here now.”

Winthrop leader and point guard Chandler Vaudrin weighed in on this phenomenon, too.

“When you see guys like that who are super talented picking Winthrop over someone like South Carolina ... it’s like, ‘Oh shoot, he picked Winthrop, let’s go see this kid play,’ ” Vaudrin said. “I think naturally any time that happens, it can grow your fan base. It can intrigue a lot of people to come and watch. And at the end of the day, they’re really good players. All the South Carolina players are really good players.”

For what Winthrop is trying to accomplish, the fact that some of its leaders are from the university’s home state is “huge,” Burns said.

“It’s a big deal, especially for guys like me, Chase, Russ and the other S.C. guys,” Burns said. “It’s crazy to think that some small-town guys come from South Carolina of all places — which has never been considered at all for basketball — to be where we are.”

When is the NCAA Selection Sunday show?

Winthrop will learn its NCAA Tournament opponent when the 2021 bracket is revealed at 6 p.m. Sunday, March 14 on CBS.