Orangeburg, S.C. - There was a time in the mid-1980s and '90s when Claflin and South Carolina State battled annually for on-court hoops supremacy in Orangeburg.For a 10-year period, the Garden City Classic featured an evening of hard-fought men's and women's basketball. Whether at Smith-Hammond-Middleton Memorial Center or the Jonas T. Kennedy Center, the games saw passions raised to a fever pitch for the two Orangeburg fan bases which in turn produced funds to cover scholarships.
"I thought it was great," said Claflin athletics director Tim Autry, who served in the same position at S.C. State at the time of the final Garden City Classic in 1996.
A mandate by then-Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference commissioner...
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