For a long time, college football has been king in the state of Alabama, but college basketball is quickly catching up, especially with the progress of a program like the Jacksonville State Gamecocks. Not long ago, cheap Jacksonville State basketball tickets were easy to find with the Gamecocks competing at the Division II level. However, the Gamecocks have returned to the Division I level and the Atlantic Sun Conference and are ready to make waves. In fact, the Gamecocks have become one of the top mid-major programs in the country, making last-minute Jacksonville State basketball tickets a hot commodity and making the Gamecocks a team to watch closely in the years to come.

Game for a Championship

The 1980s were a great time for Jacksonville State basketball. Despite the Gamecocks competing at the Division II level, they were a national powerhouse. Jacksonville State made six appearances in the Division II NCAA Tournament during the 1980s. That stretch includes the Gamecocks winning the 1985 national championship thanks to a 74-73 win over South Dakota State in the National Championship Game. Over the next decade, the Gamecocks would make three more appearances in the Elite Eight and a return trip to the Final Four in 1989, setting up Jacksonville State to jump to the Division I level in 1995.

In the Sun

After the jump to the Division I level, the Gamecocks needed a little bit of time to adjust. But more than two decades later, Jacksonville State finally experienced a breakthrough. The Gamecocks won the 2017 Ohio Valley Tournament to reach the Division I NCAA Tournament for the first time. In 2021, Jacksonville State left the Ohio Valley and returned to the Atlantic Sun, which was the program’s initial Division I conference in 1995. In their first year back in the A-Sun, the Gamecocks won the conference regular-season and tournament titles, returning to the NCAA Tournament and setting up Jacksonville State to have a promising future on the basketball court.