A new inter-conference initiative will start this season in college basketball. For years, the SEC/Big-12 Challenge and the ACC/Big-10 Challenge provided college basketball fans with some of the premier out-of-conference matchups each season. Now, with both challenges just footnotes in history, two of the involved leagues are matching up in the ACC/SEC Challenge.
The men’s ACC/SEC Challenge will start on November 28th and run through the next day, November 29th. The women’s ACC/SEC Challenge will begin on November 29th and run through the final day of the month, November 30th.
In the inaugural season of the event, Lamont Paris’ men’s South Carolina Basketball squad will take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, and Dawn Staley’s women’s program will face off with the North Carolina Tar Heels.
The men’s team will play Notre Dame at home at Colonial Life Arena on Tuesday, November 28th at 7:00. This will be the first meeting between the two programs since the Gamecocks topped the Irish in 1984.
On the women’s side of the ACC/SEC Challenge, Carolina will travel to Chapel Hill to take on the North Carolina Tar Heels on Thursday, November 30th at 7:00. This will be the first matchup between the two teams since the Gamecocks knocked the Tar Heels out of the 2022 NCAA Tournament.
Further details on the matchups (broadcast/television/streaming details, commentators, etc.) will be released closer to game time. All games will be broadcast across the ESPN/ABC family of networks.
Both Gamecock basketball programs are set to play tough out-of-conference slates prior to the always-grueling SEC portion of the schedule. The men’s group will be playing tough teams like Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, and Clemson, while the women’s squad will square off with UConn, Utah, and North Carolina.
A complete list of all the ACC/SEC Challenge contests for both the men’s challenge and the women’s challenge can be found here.