Alabama will face the South Carolina Gamecocks in an SEC matchup on Saturday, marking the first time these teams have played each other in five years.
The last time the two met was back in 2019 at South Carolina’s Williams-Brice Stadium, where the Crimson Tide came out with a 47-23 victory on the road.
Since its last meeting with Alabama, South Carolina has gone through three head coaches. The 2019 season was Will Muschamp’s last with the Gamecocks before he moved back to his alma mater, Georgia, to serve as a defensive analyst.
The team’s next hire was Mike Bobo, who served as head coach for one season and finished with a record of 2-8. Bobo, who also went to Georgia and was the quarterback from 1994 to 1997, likewise left to coach for the Bulldogs. He is currently UGA’s offensive coordinator.
The Gamecocks’ most recent hire is Shane Beamer. Beamer began coaching at Georgia Tech as a graduate assistant in 2000 and later moved to Tennessee after one season with the Yellow Jackets. He worked as an assistant coach at South Carolina from 2007-2010 before moving between several universities. He eventually returned to Columbia in 2021 to join the coaching staff as head coach.
South Carolina is not the only school in this matchup to get a new coach since the teams last played. Alabama’s legendary former head coach Nick Saban retired after the 2023 season, and the Crimson Tide hired former Washington head coach Kalen DeBoer to lead the team.
DeBoer has over 20 years of coaching experience. He began his collegiate coaching career at his alma mater, Sioux Falls, where he coached from 2000 to 2009, and then moved between multiple schools between 2010 and 2019 until he became the head coach of Fresno State in 2020.
His biggest move came in 2022 when he became the head coach at the University of Washington. Most recently, under his leadership, the Huskies made it to the 2024 college football national championship, where they fell to Michigan.
“Coach DeBoer has proven he is a winner and has done an incredible job as a head coach at each of his stops,” Athletic Director Greg Byrne said. “One of the things I told our team the other day is we are going to get someone who is not only a great coach with the X’s and O’s, but also someone who cares about his players.”
These two schools have met 16 times since 1937. Overall, Alabama leads the series 13-3.
Both teams are coming into this game fresh off a loss in Week 5, with South Carolina losing 27-3 against Ole Miss and Alabama losing to unranked Vanderbilt in a stunning 40-35 game.
“[I’m] looking forward to South Carolina here this next week,” DeBoer said. “Coach Beamer continues to build on his program there, doing some really nice things. … And they’re coming off of a tough game as well with Ole Miss and things not going their way. So, we know it’s going to be another fight here in the world of the SEC.”
The Crimson Tide will face South Carolina on Saturday on Saban Field at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Kickoff will be at 11 a.m. CT on ABC.
