Where AP voters ranked South Carolina women's basketball following fourth week of 2025-2026 season

On Monday, the AP top 25 dropped. South Carolina women’s basketball sat in the No. 3 spot in the rankings, marking its lowest spot of the season. The Gamecocks had been No. 2 since the preseason, but a loss to Texas in the Players Era Championship caused the two teams to swap spots in the poll.

For the first time this season, South Carolina did not earn a first-place vote.

All 32 AP voters included Dawn Staley’s team in their top six. 30 of them listed Carolina among the top four overall teams. None included USC in the top two. Every voter had both UConn and Texas ahead of South Carolina. Just six voters put LSU ahead of South Carolina, indicating that the Gamecocks are the No. 2 team in the SEC this week. Several other voters put UCLA ahead of the Gamecocks, and two even slotted Maryland higher.

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17 voters listed South Carolina at No. 3, and all of them kept the Gamecocks behind UConn and Texas.

13 voters listed the Gamecocks at No. 4. With Texas and UConn occupying the top two spots, most of the third-place votes ahead of South Carolina were split between UCLA and LSU. Another voter slotted USC at No. 5, and another pushed them down to No. 6.

The one voter who put the Gamecocks back at No. 6 had them at No. 1 last week.

Below are the South Carolina votes from the 15 total voters who put the Gamecocks somewhere other than No. 3.

No. 4: Angel Gray (ESPN; Bristol, Connecticut)
No. 4: Caroline Makauskas (Lexington Herald-Leader; Lexington, Kentucky)
No. 4: Christy Winters Scott (NBCSW; Washington DC)
No. 4: Emily Adams (Hartford Courant; Hartford, Connecticut)
No. 4: Jeff Linder (Cedar Rapids-Gazette; Cedar Rapids, Iowa)
No. 4: Kelly Gramlich (ACC Network; Charlotte, North Carolina)
No. 4: Khristina Williams (iHeartRadio; New York, New York)
No. 4: Mitchell Northam (WUNC; Chapel Hill, North Carolina)
No. 4: Percy Allen (Seattle Times; Seattle, Washington)
No. 4: Robert Cessna (Bryan-College Station Eagle; College Station, Texas)
No. 4: Sabreena Merchant (The Athletic; New York City, New York)
No. 4: Sam McKewon (Omaha World-Herald; Omaha, Nebraska)
No. 4: Terrika Foster-Brasby (CBS Sports; New York, New York)

No. 5: Zach Smith (Waco Tribune; Waco, Texas)

No. 6: Joe Vozzelli (News-Gazette; Champagne, Illinois)

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In all, South Carolina moved down just one spot in this week’s AP poll, despite the loss. For the first time all season, though, the Gamecocks received zero first-place votes.

In an incredible statistical and voting oddity, 2025-2026 has been the first season since 2018-2019 that South Carolina has not yet made it to No. 1.

Before next week’s poll comes out, Dawn Staley’s team will hit the road for the ACC/SEC Challenge before returning home for a matchup with a mid-major.

First, on Thursday, December 4th, South Carolina will face off against the Louisville Cardinals as part of the ACC/SEC Challenge. The game will be at the KFC Yum! Center and will tip off at 7:00 p.m. ESPN will carry the television broadcast, while the ESPN app streams the action. The Gamecocks beat North Carolina (2023-2024) and then Duke (2024-2025) in the first two ACC/SEC Challenges. USC has won the only two meetings between Jeff Walz’s Cardinals and Dawn Staley’s Gamecocks. That included a win in the 2021-2022 National Semifinal game, en route to the program’s second National Championship. The Gamecocks also lead the all-time series, 18-4, with many of the previous matchups happening when the teams were in the Metro Conference.

Following the road trip to Louisville, South Carolina will return to Colonial Life Arena for the team’s first home game in two weeks. The North Carolina Central Eagles then will be in Columbia on Sunday, December 7th for a noon tip. SEC Network will air the non-conference matchup, while the ESPN app makes it available via streaming. The two teams have not played in over a decade, but the Gamecocks hold a 2-0 all-time record in the series.

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