College of Wooster alumnus Lamont Paris’ ’96 University of South Carolina Gamecocks will be taking on the Fighting Scots’ men’s basketball team in an exhibition game on Wednesday, October 30 at 7 p.m. at Colonial Life Arena.
“We can’t thank Lamont enough for providing our team this awesome, special opportunity,” shared Doug Cline, Wooster’s head coach and a college teammate of Paris. “It is a once in a lifetime chance for our guys to play against a high major Div. I program like South Carolina. Lamont is building South Carolina into a national power. To have the opportunity to go on the road and play such a special program is something our guys will never forget.”
Paris, one of the men’s basketball program’s greatest post-Wooster success stories, served as the College’s keynote commencement speaker this spring. The 2024 Southeastern Conference Coach of the Year is in his third year as head coach at South Carolina. Last year, he helped orchestrate the greatest single-season turnaround in program history, leading South Carolina to its first NCAA Tournament since 2017. South Carolina’s 26 victories last year tied the 2016-17 Final Four team for the most in program history, while the program’s 15-win improvement was tied for the second-best mark in the nation. The Gamecocks went 13-5 in SEC play to tie for second in the conference after being picked last in the preseason poll. For his team’s achievements, Paris was a finalist for the Naismith National Coach of the Year honor.
Wooster, NCAA Div. III’s winningest team of the 2000s at 583-142 (.804), is coming off an 18-10 season. The Scots return all five starters led by North Coast Athletic Conference Player of the Year Nick Everett and two-time NCAC Most Outstanding Defensive Player Jamir Billings, who is the program’s all-time leader in assists.
The South Carolina exhibition will mark Wooster’s fifth against a Div. I team since 2017 and second against a Paris-led program. Paris previously hosted Wooster for an exhibition game in 2021 while serving as head coach at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Wooster’s other Div. I exhibitions came against Illinois State University in 2022 (Ryan Pedon ’00 is head coach), Ohio State University in 2017 (Pedon was the lead assistant coach), and Kent State University (special hurricane relief exhibition) in 2017.
Tickets to the exhibition game are free and arena doors will open at 6 p.m. There is no television broadcast or livestream of the exhibition. South Carolina’s radio crew will be doing an internet broadcast of the game. That link will be available on the men’s basketball schedule page of the athletics website on gameday.
