The South Carolina men's and women's basketball teams are set to face off against North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University and North Carolina Central University, respectively, for the first time in each program's history.
The teams also add two more Historically Black Colleges and Universities to their 2025-26 season schedule, with the women's team playing Coppin State University and the men's team playing South Carolina State University.
HBCUs are institutions that opened to educate Black students before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited segregation. Prior to this, Black students were unable to attend most colleges and universities.
These institutions now serve to continue the tradition of building leaders within the Black community and serving the communities around them. Some prominent black leaders that attended HBCUs are Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King Jr. (Morehouse), Civil Rights Activist Jesse Jackson (North Carolina A&T), former Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall (Howard), former Vice President Kamala Harris (Howard) and former Georgia State Representative Stacey Abrams (Spelman).
Women's basketball head coach Dawn Staley said her motivation to schedule both HBCUs came after struggling to convince bigger teams to play the Gamecocks out of conference.
“So you know, instead of the big competitive games, we’ve added some HBCUs just to lift up every aspect of our sport,” Staley said.
NCCU was the first state-supported liberal arts college for Black Americans in North Carolina in 1923, and it began to offer graduate programs in 1938. It also became a part of UNC’s system of schools in 1972. While NCCU started as an HBCU, Coppin State started as a school meant to train Black elementary-school teachers and eventually became a four-year institution in 1938.
South Carolina women’s basketball will play the North Carolina Central Eagles on Dec. 7 at Colonial Life Arena for the first time in program history. The North Carolina Central Eagles have found recent success under third-year head coach Terrence Baxter as they had their first winning season in 2023-24 during his time at South Carolina State.
The Eagles only had nine wins last season but had four players named to conference teams. Three of the four players returned this season and will look in the top half of its conference as NCCU is currently projected to finish fourth in the MEAC.
Coppin State will host the Gamecocks on Jan. 18 at Physical Education Complex in Baltimore, Maryland, making it the third straight season that the Eagles have hosted a power four opponent, with LSU and Arizona State being the last two.
Staley said the game at Coppin State is an opportunity that not all teams take that provides an opportunity for both schools involved.
“Not every team will go and play an HBCU on their home court,” Staley said. “We feel like it’s a great game, great competition, great coaching, and if we can lift because we play the game, we get some notoriety to the HBCUs, then we’ll do that.
South Carolina will look to beat Coppin State for the second time, defeating them 92-60 last season at Colonial Life Arena.
South Carolina men’s basketball will play both North Carolina Agriculture and Technical State University (NC A&T) and South Carolina State University. The men’s basketball team has regularly played SC State over the past few years with South Carolina holding a 23-0 record against them. However, their season opener against NC A&T will be the first matchup between the two teams.
Men's basketball assistant coach Eddie Shannon said it is important that the men's basketball team plays faces off against HBCUs.
“I think we’ve played them every year, so that’s been good to help those programs out," Shannon said. "It helps them and their recruitment of student athletes, so I think I’m happy that we could do that, and I’m happy to be part of an organization and university that’s able to.”
Men's basketball assistant coach Tanner Bronson shared a similar sentiment when asked about the decision of the Gamecocks hosting two HBCUs this season.
“I think you always want to try to contribute to helping programs and individuals that deserve to play in these games,” Bronson said. “As you go through and you play guaranteed games … you have different people that you can play, we always like to be able to mix up some teams, or play teams for the state or locally.”
NC A&T had back-to-back seasons of seven wins in the Coastal Athletic Association and will try to improve with their returning roster and three transfers as head coach Monté Ross enters his third season coaching the Aggies.
The NC A&T Aggies will also compete against the Hampton University Pirates in the 2026 NBA HBCU Classic on Feb. 13, 2026. The teams will face off at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California and receive a $100,000 donation from the NBA and AT&T.
SC State improved each year under third year head coach Erik Martin. Last season, the Bulldogs won 20 games and made the final round, losing to the MEAC champions Norfolk State. The Bulldogs look to continue that success this season against their MEAC opponents and South Carolina on Dec. 22 at Colonial Life Arena.
What's next?
South Carolina men's basketball will play NC A&T on Nov. 4, and women's basketball will play NCCU on Dec. 7 at Colonial Life Arena.