STARKVILLE — For 16 minutes Sunday afternoon, Humphrey Coliseum looked as if it would once again be a graveyard for the defending national champions.

Mississippi State was pushing No. 2 South Carolina around early on. Jerkaila Jordan was hitting shots and getting to the rim. Madina Okot was gobbling up rebounds and slowing down the mighty Gamecocks’ frontcourt. The Bulldogs were running South Carolina off the 3-point line.

But then MSU’s usual issues — turnovers, depth and occasional defensive lapses — started catching up to the Bulldogs. And the Gamecocks, a team that punishes mistakes as well as any in the country, surged ahead and never looked back. The visitors scored the final 16 points of the first half, then 17 straight in the third quarter en route to a 95-68 win.

“You can’t have seven turnovers in one quarter,” MSU head coach Sam Purcell said. “We just had some dagger turnovers that allowed them to get some easy transition opportunities. The next thing you know, with (two minutes) in the second quarter, they got the lead and that’s where the momentum changed.”

As she has so often in big games throughout her career in Starkville, Jordan came out on fire, drilling two 3-pointers in a 38-second span and scoring 12 points in the first quarter to stake the Bulldogs (13-3, 0-2 Southeastern Conference) to a nine-point lead.

The fifth-year senior guard stayed hot early in the second, and a layup from Okot put the home team ahead by double digits. At that point, South Carolina (14-1, 2-0) had yet to hit a 3-pointer, and the Gamecocks started just 3-for-13 from the floor.

“They were driving it down our throats,” South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley said. “They were sharing the basketball, they were finding who should take the shot and they were very efficient in doing so. We just really couldn’t get our footing. Sometimes it’s like that when you come on the road in this league, big crowd, energy was in the building. We just had to make some plays to keep the crowd out of it.”

Once the Gamecocks saw an outside shot go through the net, it was like a weight was lifted off the reigning champs’ shoulders. Tessa Johnson, who led South Carolina with 22 points off the bench, knocked down four 3-pointers in a row in the second quarter and scored the last eight points of the first half by herself.

With four minutes left in the half, MSU led by eight; the Bulldogs trailed by that margin as they headed to the locker room. MSU turned the ball over four times during that stretch, and the Gamecocks scored 23 points off of 20 Bulldogs turnovers in the game.

“We had to rotate, and we had to do it together as a team. I thought we did that, but the 20 turnovers were the dagger,” Purcell said. “There’s not much else to say. The free throws weren’t that big of a deal, the rebounding was phenomenal, but you can’t give the No. 2 team in the country 23 points off turnovers.”

The turnovers remained MSU’s biggest problem after halftime, and the Bulldogs’ stretch without a made field goal lasted more than 11 minutes before an Eniya Russell layup. After Jordan’s two early 3-pointers, MSU did not connect again from distance until Destiney McPhaul made one with less than eight minutes left in the fourth quarter.

Jordan finished with 24 points, and McPhaul, coming off the bench, added 14 on 6-for-9 shooting. With starting point guard Denim DeShields turning the ball over six times Sunday, McPhaul could be in line to play more minutes as the Bulldogs’ primary ball-handler.

“The way you get better is you watch, see what you did wrong, learn from it, talk about it,” McPhaul said. “Turnovers have been our biggest issue so far. We have to take care of the ball. We can’t give these teams extra possessions because that’s where we lose.”

Chloe Kitts added 17 points and 10 rebounds for South Carolina, and Te-Hina Paopao chipped in with 15 points. Raven Johnson was the primary beneficiary of MSU’s sloppiness with five steals.

The Bulldogs welcome another top-10 opponent to Starkville on Thursday night when No. 9 Oklahoma visits The Hump. MSU won seven of eight games after starting 0-2 in the SEC last year, and a similar turnaround will need to begin soon to preserve the Bulldogs’ postseason hopes.

“Each one of my individual players (has to) have that mindset that our team will get better,” Purcell said. “When your team gets better in the SEC, then you’re ready for March Madness and you’re ready for deep runs. That’s where I’m trying to help them understand. Just focus on the next game. The most important game is the next one, and so that’s the message to my team.”