South Carolina women's basketball cancels series with BYU over 'the incident' with the Duke volleyball team
Tyler Greenawalt
Sat, September 3, 2022 at 10:15 AM·2 min read
South Carolina women's head basketball coach Dawn Staley announced the Gamecocks won't face BYU in a home-and-home series that was scheduled to start this year. A Black female Duke volleyball player
accused BYU home spectators of shouting racial slurs at her during a match last week.
The Gamecocks were scheduled to open the 2022 season at home against BYU on Nov. 7 and then travel to BYU next season.
Rachel Richardson, the sophomore outside hitter for the Blue Devils,
alleged that she and her Black teammates were heckled throughout the team's match at BYU and that officials, coaches and authorities
took too long to respond to their claims. BYU eventually identified and banned the fan – who it said wasn't a student – it claimed shouted the slurs at Richardson and her teammates, but police later said that fan wasn't the heckler.
In any event, Staley didn't believe it would be smart to play BYU so soon after the incident and especially didn't want to travel to Utah in 2023. South Carolina athletic director Ray Tanner also said in a statement that he supported Staley and her staff's decision.
The BYU women's basketball team
tweeted after the announcement that the team was "extremely disappointed" in South Carolina's decision and asked, "for patience with the ongoing investigation."
Staley and the Gamecocks are coming off their second championship since 2017 after beating UConn, 64-49. She's 366–105 since becoming the head coach in 2008 with 10 consecutive NCAA tournament appearances.
Dawn Staley and the South Carolina women's basketball team won't play BYU this year or next. (Photo by Bailey Hillesheim/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)