Few mid-major programs have punched above their weight like the Wofford Terriers. In Spartanburg, South Carolina, at a school of under 2,000 students, Wofford built a Southern Conference powerhouse the old-fashioned way: player development, system basketball, and a refusal to be intimidated by anyone. Under Mike Young from 2002 to 2019, the Terriers reached the NCAA Tournament five times — 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015 and 2019 — and the 2019 team was the program's masterpiece: 30-5, SoCon champions, Fletcher Magee setting the NCAA's all-time three-point record, and a 62-56 second-round loss to Kentucky that was far closer than the seed lines suggested. Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium, 3,500 seats of pure noise, became one of the best home-court advantages in the mid-major world.
The identity never changed through the coaching transitions: Wofford teams defend, they share the ball, they take care of it, and they hit threes. The Terriers have won double-digit SoCon games in three straight seasons, and the program's culture — small school, big belief — has made Wofford the team every SoCon contender has to go through in March. The 2024-25 season looked like more of the same: Dwight Perry's Terriers went 19-16, finished sixth in the league, then ripped through the SoCon tournament — beating East Tennessee State, VMI and Furman — to earn the program's first NCAA bid since 2019. As a 15-seed, they fell 77-62 to second-seeded Tennessee. A successful season, by any reasonable measure.
What happened next was one of the stunners of the 2025 offseason. On September 12, 2025 — less than two months before the season opener, at age 37 — Wofford fired Dwight Perry. No public reason was given. The program that had just danced was suddenly coachless, and the Terriers' season teetered before it began. Ten days later, the school announced the hire: Kevin Giltner, a Virginia Tech assistant, a Wofford alumnus, and — critically — a man who had spent six seasons as Mike Young's assistant at Wofford before following him to Blacksburg for six more. The program wasn't hiring a stranger. It was bringing home family.
The 2025-26 season, against all preseason logic, was a triumph. Picked ninth in the SoCon preseason poll, Giltner's Terriers went 19-13 overall and 11-7 in league play, earning the No. 3 seed in the conference tournament. The 11 SoCon wins were the most by a first-year head coach in program history. The Terriers won nine road games — the fourth-most in school history — and did it with the classic Wofford formula: they ranked 49th nationally in assist-to-turnover ratio (1.50) and 19th in turnovers per game (9.4), taking care of the ball better than almost anyone in America. The SoCon took notice: Kahmare Holmes earned first-team All-SoCon honors, the program's first first-teamer since 2022-23, while Nils Machowski made the second team and Cayden Vasko the third. Giltner himself was a finalist for both the Hugh Durham National Coach of the Year and the Joe B. Hall First-Time Head Coach of the Year awards.
The stars were legitimate. Holmes, a 6-foot-4 guard, averaged 19.5 points and 5.7 rebounds while leading the entire SoCon in steals (2.13 per game) — a two-way force who carried the Terriers through the league grind. Machowski, the sharpshooter, averaged 17.2 points and buried 91 three-pointers, the deep threat that stretched every defense Wofford faced. Vasko ran the show at 10.4 points and 4.5 rebounds, a steady hand on a team that refused to beat itself. The season ended in heartbreak — a 75-72 loss to seventh-seeded UNC Greensboro in the SoCon quarterfinals, despite 24 points from Holmes and 22 from Machowski — but the message was clear: Wofford hadn't missed a beat. If anything, it had found another gear.
The 2026-27 season brings the cruelest math in mid-major basketball: success gets poached. Holmes transferred to DePaul, Machowski to UConn, Vasko to UCF, Rex Stirling to Jacksonville — the core of a 19-win team, scattered to the high-major winds. What remains is intriguing: Chace Watley (9.7 points, 3.3 rebounds) is the best returning player, Brian Sumpter (6.6 points, 4.9 rebounds) is a breakout candidate, and Luke Flynn is the glue. Giltner's portal class earned an A-minus grade, headlined by Black Hills State's Cam Lowe and Lander's Jacob Daniels, and freshman Jyi Dawkins arrives from Greensboro.
The optimism is real, and it's specific: for the first time, Giltner gets a full offseason to install his schemes on both ends, with a roster he chose. The SoCon figures to be wide open again, and Wofford's system — defend, share, value the ball — travels well with new faces. The Terriers have won double-digit league games three years running. The 2026-27 team won't look like the last one, but in Spartanburg, the expectation doesn't change: contend for the SoCon, win in March, and keep the little school that could right where it belongs.