South Carolina women’s basketball slid to No. 3 in this week’s AP Top 25 poll, marking its lowest ranking of the season. The Gamecocks had held the No. 2 spot since the preseason, but their loss to Texas at the Players Era Championship led to a direct swap between the two programs.
For the first time this year, South Carolina didn’t receive a single first-place vote.
All 32 AP voters still view Dawn Staley’s squad as a top-tier contender, placing USC inside their top six. Thirty voters ranked the Gamecocks in the top four, but none listed them among the top two. Every ballot had both UConn and Texas ahead of South Carolina. Only six voters ranked LSU higher, which positions the Gamecocks as the No. 2 SEC team this week. A handful of ballots had UCLA above USC, and two voters even placed Maryland ahead.
A total of 17 voters put South Carolina at No. 3, all placing UConn and Texas first and second. Another 13 voters slotted USC at No. 4, with UCLA and LSU picking up most of the third-place votes. Only one voter ranked the Gamecocks at No. 5, and another pushed them to No. 6 — a surprising drop considering that same voter had USC at No. 1 last week.
Below is where the 15 voters who didn’t place South Carolina at No. 3 ranked the Gamecocks:
No. 4:
Angel Gray (ESPN; Bristol, Connecticut)
Caroline Makauskas (Lexington Herald-Leader; Lexington, Kentucky)
Christy Winters Scott (NBCSW; Washington, D.C.)
Emily Adams (Hartford Courant; Hartford, Connecticut)
Jeff Linder (Cedar Rapids-Gazette; Cedar Rapids, Iowa)
Kelly Gramlich (ACC Network; Charlotte, North Carolina)
Khristina Williams (iHeartRadio; New York, New York)
Mitchell Northam (WUNC; Chapel Hill, North Carolina)
Percy Allen (Seattle Times; Seattle, Washington)
Robert Cessna (Bryan-College Station Eagle; College Station, Texas)
Sabreena Merchant (The Athletic; New York, New York)
Sam McKewon (Omaha World-Herald; Omaha, Nebraska)
Terrika Foster-Brasby (CBS Sports; New York, New York)
No. 5:
Zach Smith (Waco Tribune; Waco, Texas)
No. 6:
Joe Vozzelli (News-Gazette; Champaign, Illinois)
Despite the rankings shakeup, South Carolina dropped only a single position and remains firmly in the top three. Still, this marks the first time all season that the Gamecocks received zero first-place votes, and it continues a rare trend: the 2025–2026 season is the first since 2018–2019 in which USC has yet to climb to No. 1.
Before the next AP poll arrives, South Carolina faces a challenging two-game stretch. First up is a road test in the ACC/SEC Challenge, followed by a return to Columbia for the team’s first home matchup in two weeks.
On Thursday, December 4, South Carolina travels to Louisville to take on the Cardinals at the KFC Yum! Center, with tipoff set for 7 p.m. The game airs on ESPN and streams on the ESPN app. The Gamecocks have won the first two ACC/SEC Challenge matchups — against North Carolina (2023–24) and Duke (2024–25) — and are undefeated in two historic meetings with Jeff Walz’s Cardinals under Dawn Staley. That includes their victory in the 2022 Final Four on the way to USC’s second national title. South Carolina leads the all-time series 18–4, dating back to their Metro Conference clashes.
After the Louisville trip, USC returns to Colonial Life Arena on Sunday, December 7, hosting North Carolina Central at noon. The SEC Network will televise the game, with ESPN app streaming also available. The Gamecocks and Eagles haven’t played in more than 10 years, but USC holds a 2–0 advantage in the series.
