Gamecocks are adding another weekend for official recruiting visits. Here’s why
South Carolina is changing up its football recruiting strategy this offseason. The move stems back to almost a year ago, when Gamecock head coach Shane Beamer pitched an idea to Darren Uscher, the team’s director of player personnel and recruiting.
That pitch? Start USC’s official visit efforts a month earlier than normal.
“We just got to talking about it,” Beamer said. “Let’s try and be like the first official visit, and get a chance to get guys on campus early in May, probably their first official visit, hopefully set the bar high and then go from there.”
From that conversation, South Carolina’s new weekend of recruiting visits, set for May 1, was born.
Last season, the Gamecocks hosted recruits for summer visits on three weekends in June. Those weekends are set to stay in place, meaning the May weekend serves as an additional chance for USC to get visits in the door.
Beamer said at a press conference Tuesday that bringing in a larger amount of recruits was one of the main motivations for adding the weekend. USC caps its weekend visits at about 12 players, whereas other programs might welcome a larger volume of recruits on a given weekend. Having the extra weekend in May allows the Gamecocks to bring an additional 10 to 12 players to Columbia this summer, Beamer said.
Those “official visits” are the kind that last 48 hours and are paid for by the university.
“We wanted to create another weekend just to have four opportunities now to bring guys in on official visits, which I’m glad we did, because we’ve got four weekends now. I think every weekend has at least 10 people coming, so you’re able to get more people here on official visits,” Beamer said. “So that was the reasoning behind it, another weekend to get guys here, and then just an opportunity to get guys here in May. The more you can get them on campus, the better.”
The sixth-year head coach said the additional weekend also helps the Gamecocks be more strategic with their summer recruiting. It doesn’t make sense to bring a player on a visit before the fall if they feel the player’s recruitment could stretch out until December, Beamer said. The players who are compatible with summer visits are the ones who will commit early — then, USC can bring them back to help recruit other players.
“They’re taking their official visits in the summertime, and then they’re going to make a decision before they go into their senior year,” Beamer said. “Guys that took their official visit here committed, but then would just come back on their own every weekend to help recruit other guys. The Harris twins, I feel like, were here every weekend last year, in June, because they were coming, and they wanted to be back around and help recruit other guys when they came on visits, which was huge.”
Before Beamer and his staff can focus fully on their summer of hosting recruits, USC has three more spring practices this week, starting Wednesday and running through Saturday. Beamer said the Gamecocks will also have some recruits at the Garnet and Black Spring Fest this weekend.
“We’ll have a lot of recruits here on Saturday, and they’ll be here for practice on Saturday morning,” Beamer said. “It’s on campus, and it’s open to the public, so any recruits that want to come over there, I think it will be great. We’ll certainly encourage them to.”
This story was originally published April 8, 2026 at 8:00 AM with the headline "Gamecocks are adding another weekend for official recruiting visits. Here’s why."