The last time Maryland men’s basketball played South Carolina, the Terps were still members of the Atlantic Coast Conference.
More than two decades later, the two teams will meet again in a much different era of college basketball. Maryland has since moved from the ACC to the Big Ten, and the two programs will reunite as nonconference opponents for just the seventh time in series history.
The program announced Tuesday that Maryland will face South Carolina on Dec. 19 at Baltimore’s CFG Bank Arena. The matchup will mark the 59th meeting between the Terps and Gamecocks and the first since the 2005 NIT semifinals. It will also be the programs’ first meeting in Baltimore.
The rivalry dates back more than a century, beginning during the 1924-25 season, when both schools competed as members of the Southern Conference.
In the first meeting, on Feb. 1, 1925, Maryland earned a 38-22 victory. The teams remained conference opponents for decades, competing in the ACC from 1953 until South Carolina departed the league in 1971.
Maryland holds a 31-27 advantage in the all-time series, but South Carolina claimed the most recent matchup, defeating the Terps 77-65 in the 2005 NIT at Madison Square Garden. The Terps were led by head coach Gary Williams that season.
Twenty-one years later, another Williams is leading the Terps. Entering his second season in College Park, Buzz Williams is looking to elevate a program that missed the NCAA Tournament in his first year at the helm.
He has the No. 14 recruiting class in the country, according to 247 Sports, headlined by five-star freshman small forward Baba Oladotun, who played at James Hubert Blake High School in Silver Spring.
The upcoming season will also mark 25 years since Maryland captured its lone national championship in 2002.
The South Carolina matchup is the fourth nonconference game Maryland has announced for the 2026-27 season. The Terps previously announced contests against Georgetown on Nov. 7 and against Virginia on Nov. 13, along with a Nov. 24 matchup against Tennessee as part of the Players Era Tournament.






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