Dawn Staley, South Carolina to travel to an HBCU next season
11/13/2024 10:03 PM
This season, Dawn Staley and South Carolina are hosting an HBCU and they plan to travel to play at one next year. The Lady Gamecocks will host Coppin State University in their home opener on Thursday at 7:30 PM EST. Per comments by Staley obtained by South Carolina beat writer Alan Cole, Coppin “moved some things around” to schedule the matchup with the defending national champions and South Carolina will return the favor next season with a trip to Coppin.
Staley was clear in her intention to schedule an HBCU opponent, seeing it as a great opportunity for a smaller program to play one of the best teams in the country and get more well-needed exposure.
She hinted at this on social media, stating, "When going to the peeps here on this app allows you to converse with great people and get options to complete schedules WINNING … we gotta game y'all. Paperwork is not complete, but we are good for it! I love my HBCUs. Thank you all for reaching out! Love up," she tweeted on X.
Staley has expressed her commitment to supporting smaller schools, referencing her experience at Temple during a press conference. "When I was at Temple, we couldn't get a top team to play us besides Rutgers and Tennessee. Those were the only two coaches who really gave us an opportunity. It hurt them more than it hurt us. We were an up-and-coming program. We could challenge you. It didn't make sense for them, so a lot of them said 'No.' But I'll always remember what coaches Vivian Stringer and Pat Summitt did for us," Staley said.
This isn’t the first defending champion that Coppin State has faced. The team hosted 2023 National Champions LSU at the start of last season, in which Angel Reese said that she would’ve loved to have attended an HBCU.
"I mean, honestly, I would have loved to go to HBCU. Having the resources and opportunities they don’t, they’re not the same, of course. But one day, being able to give back to a community like this, and being able to, you know, we came here and we had to pay them to play us. So being able to do that, of course, I remember my experience playing against Poly at Morgan was just like this. And being able to have the whole city coming out and so many people coming out tonight and supporting us has just been amazing for me.”
Coppin stepping up to play South Carolina will certainly be an amazing opportunity for the program and HBCU basketball in general to get attention and an infusion of money and resources. The game will be broadcast on SEC Network on Thursday evening.
The post Dawn Staley, South Carolina to travel to an HBCU next season appeared first on ClutchPoints.
