The story behind Gamecocks star Aliyah Boston’s colorful braids
Aliyah Boston has been going with braids in her hair since her junior year of high school.
She didn’t try a vivid color in her hair before college, but her aunt once put the idea out there. Once the Gamecocks’ star forward made it to South Carolina, she tried out a purple shade for her braids.
A seemingly endless curiosity followed.
“Ooh, I wonder how I would look in this?” she thought. “I wonder if I could pull this off?”
A front-runner for national Player of the Year honors, Boston has tried everything from blue, purple, orange, pink and the rainbow. Three years in, she started to run out of ideas, so she’s had her hairdresser, Alana, pick out two of her most recent colors.
“I put a lot of trust (in her), but she knows what she’s doing,” Boston told The State. “She has not disappointed because she knows I love the colors. The world is her oyster.”
For the NCAA tournament, Boston is going with a purple and pink split. Just before the tournament, her hair was primarily orange with some yellow mixed in, which debuted just before the Gamecocks’ matchup with the Tennessee Volunteers in February.
After the game, which South Carolina won 67-53, Boston joked she had a feeling her hairdresser was going to go with an orange shade.
“I said nothing because I’m not gonna mess up her vibe,” Boston said. “Man, I walked in, and I was like, ‘There’s no way,’ and orange was right there. I was like, ‘All right, here we go.’ But she rocked it.”
Boston has been updating her hair color almost every month since her freshman year, and she’s lost count of how many time she’s changed it.
Her favorite hair color? Boston gave many answers in quick succession — the orange was “top tier,” but she did a pink she liked, and there was once a blue-and-purple combination. She eventually decided she couldn’t answer.
“It’s so hard,” she said. “I love them all.”
