CLEVELAND – After South Carolina women’s basketball's loss to Iowa in last season’s Final Four, Raven Johnson watched her performance. Then she watched it again and again until she had seen it over 100 times.

The then-freshman guard wanted to quit playing basketball.

Johnson cried in her room after seeing multiple times Iowa star Caitlin Clark snub her while she was wide open as South Carolina’s undefeated season came to a crashing end.

During the offseason, Johnson leaned on her faith and locked back in to working over the offseason. A year later, Johnson is ready to face Clark and the Hawkeyes once again with a national championship on the line.

“It got to the point where people were like, ‘Can you stop watching that game?’ ” Johnson said Saturday. “I was like, 'I can’t.' ”

The No. 1 seed Gamecocks (37-0) can avenge last season against the No. 1 seed Hawkeyes (34-4) in the national championship on Sunday (3 p.m., ABC) at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse.

During the Final Four against Iowa last season, Johnson was wide open at the top of the arc with the basketball when Clark, standing roughly 10 feet away, waved towards Johnson to show she didn’t respect her enough to guard her.

The moment weighed on her heavily.

Johnson didn’t go to coach Dawn Staley to talk about wanting to quit. It was her teammates, especially former teammate Laeticia Amihere, who took Johnson to church.

“I remember LA coming to my room and she saw me crying one day,” Johnson said. “I don’t even know how she got in my room. I thought I locked the door. She got me closer to God. I started going to church and ever since then, my mindset changed.”

Johnson credited Amihere for getting her past that moment and back into the gym to focus on addressing her weaknesses. Her 3-point percentage jumped from 24% to 37%.

“That is what you need for your breakthrough,” Staley said. “And if you don't have enough just power, strength, your breakthrough will never happen. Raven is going to be a great player because she was able to break through that moment and catapult her into that next level now.”

CARDOSO'S BIG NIGHT: Why Kamilla Cardoso thanked South Carolina women's basketball teammates for timely passes

Her teammates noticed a difference in her attitude. Junior forward Sania Feagin said Johnson took the moment to heart and is constantly in the gym.

Johnson deleted social media and stayed off her phone to help redirect her focus. After a year of work, Johnson has become a vocal leader and a floor general as the team’s point guard. She’s ready to match up against Clark again.

“The journey of her having a voice, and no matter what that voice is, she's in such a learning phase of her life,” Staley said. “She's open to learning – not just basketball, but history. She's learning what she likes. She's learning a pathway of who she wants to be. And she's unafraid to go out there to say or do some things that, it will rock you a little bit, it will make you laugh, but it is who she's becoming.”

Evan Gerike covers South Carolina women's basketball for the Greenville News. Email him at egerike@citizentimes.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanGerike.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: South Carolina's Raven Johnson wanted to quit after Caitlin Clark snub