My First Coastal Carolina Game
7/21/2026 2:50:00 PM | General
WHERE THIS COMES FROM
We had a simple question for Teal Nation. What's the first Coastal Carolina sporting event you remember attending?
Some remembered football's inaugural season. Others recalled baseball games before Springs Brooks Stadium existed. Some discovered Coastal as students. Others found it after moving to the Grand Strand, through their children, or by chance on a weekend afternoon.
There's David Parker, who remembers attending a men's basketball game to watch Howard White play in Kimbel Gym in 1974. Or Ed Flowers, who attended softball's doubleheader this past spring against Troy. His 9-year-old daughter? She's hooked now.
We heard from Nezzie McManus-Harris, who remembers her first game. It was 2003, that very first Coastal football game. A member of the marching band, she met the man who would become her husband that year. Today, they have five children and a daughter who now attends Coastal.
Samantha Mikowski's story was one familiar to many. Her first game was football in 2009 with her roommates from Building 401. Cindy Thibodeau's first game? Soccer, 1979.
Overall, the stories we heard span more than six decades of Chanticleer Athletics. Some begin with championship moments. Others start with something as simple as catching a foul ball or attending a game with family.
Yet despite different generations, different sports and different backgrounds, they all seem to arrive at the same conclusion.
Every Chanticleer has a first game.
And for many, that first game became the beginning of something much bigger.
It was the start of a lifetime chasing that feeling you get at your first Coastal Carolina game.
JUST LIKE THAT… HE WAS HOOKED
Eric Koehler didn't grow up cheering for Coastal Carolina.
He isn't an alumnus. He doesn't have family ties to the university.
He simply moved to the Myrtle Beach area in late 2022 and, a few months later, decided to spend an afternoon at Springs Brooks Stadium for Opening Day.
The festive day featured home runs, a lively crowd and a Coastal victory. By the time he walked back to his car, something had changed.
He was hooked.
Since that first baseball game in 2023, Koehler hasn't missed a home game. Baseball led to football. Football led to basketball. Today, he can be found supporting nearly every Chanticleer program.
"The best part of attending so many events has been the relationships I have built through these teams, games and matches," he said.
WHO CAN FORGET CATCHING A FOUL BALL
For Caleb Ward, his Coastal Carolina journey began a little earlier.
Growing up just down the road from Conway, his childhood memories were filled with Chanticleer athletics.
He remembers basketball games at Kimbel Arena in the late 1990s, where, as a kid, he got his first taste of Coastal sports.
But the first one he truly remembers came when he was 9 years old in 2002. During a game at Pelicans Ballpark during the Baseball at the Beach tournament, Ward caught a foul ball, a keepsake that still sits in a trophy case today with the score written across it.
"(The game) may have been a loss but it helped start a lifetime of chasing Coastal baseball memories," he said. "From being a season tickets holder at the old Watson Stadium to continuing that now at Springs Brooks with the man who started it all and bleeds Coastal as much as me, my uncle Billy Quick, a former (Coastal) men's tennis player."
Now, all these years later Ward considers Coastal home.
"My blood runs Coastal Teal & Black," he said. "Once you experience Coastal, it gets inside you and changes your DNA."
FATHER-DAUGHTER BONDING
Chris Howel's first game came from a different, but familiar, path.
His daughter arrived at Coastal in the fall of 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the family tradition they had hoped to begin.
But eventually in 2021, they finally got the experience they'd been waiting for.
"(It) was so exciting not only watching big wins, like the Kansas game, but also watching Grayson McCall at quarterback, who is from our area of Charlotte, NC."
Today, those Saturdays have become cherished memories between father and daughter (a 2023 Coastal graduate), which serves as further proof that it won't be the score you remember from your first Coastal game.
"I would tell anyone who is thinking of going to a game that it is great family fun and entertaining!"
FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS
For Steven Graham, that beginning came long before sold-out crowds and nationally ranked teams.
His first Coastal baseball game came in 1979, when the program called a modest field with what he described as "literally a 50-seat bleacher" home.
He remembers watching future Hall of Fame coach Gary Gilmore long before he led the Chanticleers to a national championship, another reminder of just how far Coastal Athletics has come over the past five decades.
THE VERY FIRST
For another generation of fans, everything changed on Sept. 6, 2003.
That of course is the day Coastal Carolina football broke onto the scene against Newberry, an exciting 21-14 victory for the Chants.
Joshua Singleton, class of 2008, still remembers football's inaugural game like it was yesterday.
The excitement of tailgating, the dramatic finish, fans rushing the field and Coach David Bennett shouting, "Take a knee!" as the goalposts eventually made their way into the retention pond.
Nearly 8,000 fans packed the brand-new Brooks Stadium that day to see a long list of Coastal Carolina firsts.
The first tailgate. The first time the team took the field. The first touchdown (an Aundres Perkins 2-yard touchdown run with 6:17 left in the first quarter). The first game-winning drive.
Newberry tied the game at 14-14 with just over two minutes remaining. Coastal then took possession at its own 3-yard line after the kickoff.
Instead of playing conservatively, the Chanticleers drove 97 yards.
With seven seconds left, quarterback Will Richardson hit Jerheme Urban for the game-winning touchdown.
For Singleton, he said he doesn't really remember too much from the game before the eventual winning drive. But he vividly remembers the finish and the emotions that followed.
"From that point on I was a Coastal fan for life," Singleton wrote.
TWENTY-ONE YEARS LATER
For Alex Souza, becoming a Chanticleer fan didn't happen the day he arrived on campus.
A 2008 Coastal graduate who moved to South Carolina from the Northeast, Souza admits he knew very little about college athletics when he enrolled in 2004. During his freshman year, he spent more time on the pickup soccer fields and in the Edwards Building than at athletic events.
"I went to some games here and there, but nothing grabbed me," he recalled.
That changed in the fall of 2005.
After hearing the buzz surrounding the football program entering its third season, Souza attended the home opener before making his way to Brooks Stadium the following week for a match up against defending FCS national champion James Madison.
Standing on the hill behind the end zone with thousands of fellow students, he watched the Chanticleers score 14 unanswered points to stun the Dukes.
"We rushed the field," Souza said. "Many of us were having our first true college experience."
That Monday, he joined the student fan group.
Now, after a brief three-year journey away from Conway, Souza has spent 18 of the last 21 years working with or around Coastal Athletics.
"Other than a 3-year detour to see what else was out there, I came back as fast as I could."
NOW HE CAPTURES THE MOMENTS
For Chris DeBoer, his story began before he ever became a student at Coastal.
Visiting campus with his family, they decided to attend a football game against Georgia Southern in October of 2022.
His family wanted to leave a little early. Thankfully for DeBoer, he convinced them to stay because shortly after Chanticleer running back C.J. Beasley soared over a defender for the now-famous "Myrtle Hurdle," a moment that left a lasting impression.
"I remember jumping up and down and yelling at my family 'I told you so, I told you so, I told you we'd win.'"
By the end of the visit, DeBoer knew where he wanted to spend the next four years.
"After that moment Coastal was my choice of college easily."
Now, DeBoer is a member of the Coastal Carolina Athletics New & Creative Media team, capturing moments and memories for the next generation of Coastal fans.
THEY NEVER STOPPED COMING BACK
Then there was Nancy Rabon, whose first Coastal experience wasn't at a game at all.
While attending a Coastal Athletics event with her niece, they met a Chanticleer baseball pitcher. That brief interaction sparked her niece's interest, and she asked if they could go watch the team play.
"The very next Friday, we were sitting in our seats at Springs Brooks Stadium," Rabon recalled. "A few games later, we became season ticket holders."
What started as one baseball game quickly became much more.
Today, they attend every home baseball game, follow the Chants on the road whenever they can and have expanded their support to football and men's basketball.
"Needless to say, we're proud to be Chanticleers!"
A JOURNEY TO FANDOM
And of course, there was Wade Zufall, whose journey to becoming a Coastal fan started more than 600 miles away.
A Maryland resident with no previous ties to Coastal Carolina, Zufall attended his first Chanticleer baseball game in 2025 while visiting Conway.
He eventually followed that Coastal team all the way through its run to Omaha and has continued making trips back to Conway ever since.
"We love Conway," Zufall said.
AND NOW… THE NEXT
Every Chanticleer has a first game.
For some, it was 1974. For others, it was last season.
But no matter when it happened, they all keep coming back, chasing the feeling they found the first time they walked into a Coastal Carolina sporting event. Few remember the final score. Nearly everyone remembers how they felt.
Now, with a new year of Coastal sports right around the corner, the next opportunity for someone's first game awaits.
Maybe it will be women's soccer's match against Charleston Southern on Aug. 13. It could be volleyball's match against Duke on Aug. 28 or men's soccer taking on Stetson on Aug. 29.
Or maybe it's football's game against Fordham Sept. 12.
No matter which sport, which game or which date.
The next generation of memories will be made soon enough.
MORE MEMORIES FROM TEAL NATION
"Just a spring attended a youth camp ran by Coach Ryan Beard, and staff. My first coastal Carolina experience with my son. Love the atmosphere and the personality. Really looking forward to catching a game this fall. We are from the Cincinnati, Ohio area. Can't wait to see the culture that the football team is going to have this year." – Mark Moses
"I was the first administrator in Atheneum Hall when it opened in 1965-66 … I taught students Spanish, my wife ran our Language Lab. I coached Basketball and Baseball. I also was named a faculty advisor for our Student Council …." - Larry & Ginny Biddle
"Obviously, the 1st football game was incredible, but my freshman year (the year before) the women's basketball team won a triple overtime game like 120-118 or something crazy like that. It's up there for me personally as one of the greatest games I've ever seen." – Dominic Calvano
"I was hired as the first band director during the 2003 inaugural football season — so the first football game was mine." – Kurry Seymour
"1990s, men's basketball when Tab Allen was the announcer, Tony Dunkin and Mohammed Acha played. My brother Christopher Hughes was a cheerleader." – Charlene Leigh
"2003 the day Coastal Carolina played the first home football game. Our son was a student, and we were able to get great tickets. Season ticket holder since. Love CCU" – Sharon Charles Anderson
"1984 soccer, Paul Banta was coach and we beat Birmingham Southern 17-0" – Ira Hertzoff
"2003- CCU's first football game. I was 13 and visiting my dad who lived in Pawleys Island. We tailgated, bought gear, etc. Coastal won, it was an awesome time. I got to go back to Columbia with a fun story about a school that wasn't SCar or Clem. 5 years later I was a Chant." – Shane Norris
"9/10/2005. My freshman year. We beat No. 1 ranked defending I-AA national champ JMU. I watched from the grass berm behind the north end zone. Stormed the field and helped tear the goalposts down. Have a blurry postgame pic from midfield taken on a motorola flip phone somewhere." – Micah (@GoesByMicah)
"Would have been a men's basketball game at the start of the 1994-95 season -- my freshman year. I went with my roommate." – Kevin Corn
"Coastal at App State football in 2021! Had just decided I wanted to go to Coastal and wanted to go to a game. App was the closest to home, so I told my mom that I'd buy tickets if she drove us the 5 hours! Sadly, it came with an L and an ear infection for this guy. But no school!" – Coastal Carolina Banana Man
"2016 Raleigh Regional vs. St Mary's. I had just graduated HS down the street and made the trek over to the park. Little did I know what magic would follow after that game." – @TealTroubadours
We had a simple question for Teal Nation. What's the first Coastal Carolina sporting event you remember attending?
Some remembered football's inaugural season. Others recalled baseball games before Springs Brooks Stadium existed. Some discovered Coastal as students. Others found it after moving to the Grand Strand, through their children, or by chance on a weekend afternoon.
There's David Parker, who remembers attending a men's basketball game to watch Howard White play in Kimbel Gym in 1974. Or Ed Flowers, who attended softball's doubleheader this past spring against Troy. His 9-year-old daughter? She's hooked now.
We heard from Nezzie McManus-Harris, who remembers her first game. It was 2003, that very first Coastal football game. A member of the marching band, she met the man who would become her husband that year. Today, they have five children and a daughter who now attends Coastal.
Samantha Mikowski's story was one familiar to many. Her first game was football in 2009 with her roommates from Building 401. Cindy Thibodeau's first game? Soccer, 1979.
Overall, the stories we heard span more than six decades of Chanticleer Athletics. Some begin with championship moments. Others start with something as simple as catching a foul ball or attending a game with family.
Yet despite different generations, different sports and different backgrounds, they all seem to arrive at the same conclusion.
Every Chanticleer has a first game.
And for many, that first game became the beginning of something much bigger.
It was the start of a lifetime chasing that feeling you get at your first Coastal Carolina game.
JUST LIKE THAT… HE WAS HOOKED
Eric Koehler didn't grow up cheering for Coastal Carolina.
He isn't an alumnus. He doesn't have family ties to the university.
He simply moved to the Myrtle Beach area in late 2022 and, a few months later, decided to spend an afternoon at Springs Brooks Stadium for Opening Day.
The festive day featured home runs, a lively crowd and a Coastal victory. By the time he walked back to his car, something had changed.
He was hooked.
Since that first baseball game in 2023, Koehler hasn't missed a home game. Baseball led to football. Football led to basketball. Today, he can be found supporting nearly every Chanticleer program.
"The best part of attending so many events has been the relationships I have built through these teams, games and matches," he said.
WHO CAN FORGET CATCHING A FOUL BALL
For Caleb Ward, his Coastal Carolina journey began a little earlier.
Growing up just down the road from Conway, his childhood memories were filled with Chanticleer athletics.
He remembers basketball games at Kimbel Arena in the late 1990s, where, as a kid, he got his first taste of Coastal sports.
But the first one he truly remembers came when he was 9 years old in 2002. During a game at Pelicans Ballpark during the Baseball at the Beach tournament, Ward caught a foul ball, a keepsake that still sits in a trophy case today with the score written across it.
"(The game) may have been a loss but it helped start a lifetime of chasing Coastal baseball memories," he said. "From being a season tickets holder at the old Watson Stadium to continuing that now at Springs Brooks with the man who started it all and bleeds Coastal as much as me, my uncle Billy Quick, a former (Coastal) men's tennis player."
Now, all these years later Ward considers Coastal home.
"My blood runs Coastal Teal & Black," he said. "Once you experience Coastal, it gets inside you and changes your DNA."
FATHER-DAUGHTER BONDING
Chris Howel's first game came from a different, but familiar, path.
His daughter arrived at Coastal in the fall of 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the family tradition they had hoped to begin.
But eventually in 2021, they finally got the experience they'd been waiting for.
"(It) was so exciting not only watching big wins, like the Kansas game, but also watching Grayson McCall at quarterback, who is from our area of Charlotte, NC."
Today, those Saturdays have become cherished memories between father and daughter (a 2023 Coastal graduate), which serves as further proof that it won't be the score you remember from your first Coastal game.
"I would tell anyone who is thinking of going to a game that it is great family fun and entertaining!"
FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS
For Steven Graham, that beginning came long before sold-out crowds and nationally ranked teams.
His first Coastal baseball game came in 1979, when the program called a modest field with what he described as "literally a 50-seat bleacher" home.
He remembers watching future Hall of Fame coach Gary Gilmore long before he led the Chanticleers to a national championship, another reminder of just how far Coastal Athletics has come over the past five decades.
THE VERY FIRST
For another generation of fans, everything changed on Sept. 6, 2003.
That of course is the day Coastal Carolina football broke onto the scene against Newberry, an exciting 21-14 victory for the Chants.
Joshua Singleton, class of 2008, still remembers football's inaugural game like it was yesterday.
The excitement of tailgating, the dramatic finish, fans rushing the field and Coach David Bennett shouting, "Take a knee!" as the goalposts eventually made their way into the retention pond.
Nearly 8,000 fans packed the brand-new Brooks Stadium that day to see a long list of Coastal Carolina firsts.
The first tailgate. The first time the team took the field. The first touchdown (an Aundres Perkins 2-yard touchdown run with 6:17 left in the first quarter). The first game-winning drive.
Newberry tied the game at 14-14 with just over two minutes remaining. Coastal then took possession at its own 3-yard line after the kickoff.
Instead of playing conservatively, the Chanticleers drove 97 yards.
With seven seconds left, quarterback Will Richardson hit Jerheme Urban for the game-winning touchdown.
For Singleton, he said he doesn't really remember too much from the game before the eventual winning drive. But he vividly remembers the finish and the emotions that followed.
"From that point on I was a Coastal fan for life," Singleton wrote.
TWENTY-ONE YEARS LATER
For Alex Souza, becoming a Chanticleer fan didn't happen the day he arrived on campus.
A 2008 Coastal graduate who moved to South Carolina from the Northeast, Souza admits he knew very little about college athletics when he enrolled in 2004. During his freshman year, he spent more time on the pickup soccer fields and in the Edwards Building than at athletic events.
"I went to some games here and there, but nothing grabbed me," he recalled.
That changed in the fall of 2005.
After hearing the buzz surrounding the football program entering its third season, Souza attended the home opener before making his way to Brooks Stadium the following week for a match up against defending FCS national champion James Madison.
Standing on the hill behind the end zone with thousands of fellow students, he watched the Chanticleers score 14 unanswered points to stun the Dukes.
"We rushed the field," Souza said. "Many of us were having our first true college experience."
That Monday, he joined the student fan group.
Now, after a brief three-year journey away from Conway, Souza has spent 18 of the last 21 years working with or around Coastal Athletics.
"Other than a 3-year detour to see what else was out there, I came back as fast as I could."
NOW HE CAPTURES THE MOMENTS
For Chris DeBoer, his story began before he ever became a student at Coastal.
Visiting campus with his family, they decided to attend a football game against Georgia Southern in October of 2022.
His family wanted to leave a little early. Thankfully for DeBoer, he convinced them to stay because shortly after Chanticleer running back C.J. Beasley soared over a defender for the now-famous "Myrtle Hurdle," a moment that left a lasting impression.
"I remember jumping up and down and yelling at my family 'I told you so, I told you so, I told you we'd win.'"
By the end of the visit, DeBoer knew where he wanted to spend the next four years.
"After that moment Coastal was my choice of college easily."
Now, DeBoer is a member of the Coastal Carolina Athletics New & Creative Media team, capturing moments and memories for the next generation of Coastal fans.
THEY NEVER STOPPED COMING BACK
Then there was Nancy Rabon, whose first Coastal experience wasn't at a game at all.
While attending a Coastal Athletics event with her niece, they met a Chanticleer baseball pitcher. That brief interaction sparked her niece's interest, and she asked if they could go watch the team play.
"The very next Friday, we were sitting in our seats at Springs Brooks Stadium," Rabon recalled. "A few games later, we became season ticket holders."
What started as one baseball game quickly became much more.
Today, they attend every home baseball game, follow the Chants on the road whenever they can and have expanded their support to football and men's basketball.
"Needless to say, we're proud to be Chanticleers!"
A JOURNEY TO FANDOM
And of course, there was Wade Zufall, whose journey to becoming a Coastal fan started more than 600 miles away.
A Maryland resident with no previous ties to Coastal Carolina, Zufall attended his first Chanticleer baseball game in 2025 while visiting Conway.
He eventually followed that Coastal team all the way through its run to Omaha and has continued making trips back to Conway ever since.
"We love Conway," Zufall said.
AND NOW… THE NEXT
Every Chanticleer has a first game.
For some, it was 1974. For others, it was last season.
But no matter when it happened, they all keep coming back, chasing the feeling they found the first time they walked into a Coastal Carolina sporting event. Few remember the final score. Nearly everyone remembers how they felt.
Now, with a new year of Coastal sports right around the corner, the next opportunity for someone's first game awaits.
Maybe it will be women's soccer's match against Charleston Southern on Aug. 13. It could be volleyball's match against Duke on Aug. 28 or men's soccer taking on Stetson on Aug. 29.
Or maybe it's football's game against Fordham Sept. 12.
No matter which sport, which game or which date.
The next generation of memories will be made soon enough.
MORE MEMORIES FROM TEAL NATION
"Just a spring attended a youth camp ran by Coach Ryan Beard, and staff. My first coastal Carolina experience with my son. Love the atmosphere and the personality. Really looking forward to catching a game this fall. We are from the Cincinnati, Ohio area. Can't wait to see the culture that the football team is going to have this year." – Mark Moses
"I was the first administrator in Atheneum Hall when it opened in 1965-66 … I taught students Spanish, my wife ran our Language Lab. I coached Basketball and Baseball. I also was named a faculty advisor for our Student Council …." - Larry & Ginny Biddle
"Obviously, the 1st football game was incredible, but my freshman year (the year before) the women's basketball team won a triple overtime game like 120-118 or something crazy like that. It's up there for me personally as one of the greatest games I've ever seen." – Dominic Calvano
"I was hired as the first band director during the 2003 inaugural football season — so the first football game was mine." – Kurry Seymour
"1990s, men's basketball when Tab Allen was the announcer, Tony Dunkin and Mohammed Acha played. My brother Christopher Hughes was a cheerleader." – Charlene Leigh
"2003 the day Coastal Carolina played the first home football game. Our son was a student, and we were able to get great tickets. Season ticket holder since. Love CCU" – Sharon Charles Anderson
"1984 soccer, Paul Banta was coach and we beat Birmingham Southern 17-0" – Ira Hertzoff
"2003- CCU's first football game. I was 13 and visiting my dad who lived in Pawleys Island. We tailgated, bought gear, etc. Coastal won, it was an awesome time. I got to go back to Columbia with a fun story about a school that wasn't SCar or Clem. 5 years later I was a Chant." – Shane Norris
"9/10/2005. My freshman year. We beat No. 1 ranked defending I-AA national champ JMU. I watched from the grass berm behind the north end zone. Stormed the field and helped tear the goalposts down. Have a blurry postgame pic from midfield taken on a motorola flip phone somewhere." – Micah (@GoesByMicah)
"Would have been a men's basketball game at the start of the 1994-95 season -- my freshman year. I went with my roommate." – Kevin Corn
"Coastal at App State football in 2021! Had just decided I wanted to go to Coastal and wanted to go to a game. App was the closest to home, so I told my mom that I'd buy tickets if she drove us the 5 hours! Sadly, it came with an L and an ear infection for this guy. But no school!" – Coastal Carolina Banana Man
"2016 Raleigh Regional vs. St Mary's. I had just graduated HS down the street and made the trek over to the park. Little did I know what magic would follow after that game." – @TealTroubadours
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