Lamont Paris to remain South Carolina’s basketball coach for 2026-27, per report
By Ethan Stone
Published:
South Carolina basketball is set to roll with head coach Lamont Paris for at least one more season, according to a report from Gamecocks writer David Cloninger Tuesday morning.
With the current state of college and SEC basketball in mind, this comes as a bit of surprise.
Paris’ time at South Carolina has been defined by extremes. He has yet to finish a season at South Carolina between 15 and 25 wins. Paris won 11 games his first year, 26 games his second year, 12 games his 3rd year and, so far, 13 games in his 4th year. If you combine Paris’ conference wins from 2023, 2025 and 2026, you still wouldn’t match his SEC win total from 2024 alone.
That’s not quite the progression you want to see from a high-major head coach.
South Carolina’s struggles have largely stemmed from poor evaluation through the transfer portal. Meechie Johnson, who also played for USC in 2024 and can only barely be considered a transfer as a result, has been only consistent scorer for the Gamecocks this season. The other 5 incoming transfers — most of whom came from mid or low-major programs — largely failed to translate their skills to SEC basketball.
Paris is going to have to have a massive offseason in order to turn things around in 2026-27.
The SEC Tournament starts on Wednesday. Here’s a look at the latest odds to win it all, via Kalshi:
Ethan Stone is a Tennessee graduate and loves all things college football and college basketball. Firm believer in fouling while up 3.
