Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's New Hampshire comeback Tuesday set the stage for a dramatic showdown with Sen. Barack Obama this month in South Carolina, a state that could give native son John Edwards a rude homecoming.

And a revived Republican Sen. John McCain will try again to translate a New Hampshire win into a South Carolina victory.

South Carolina isn't quite next -- Michigan votes next Tuesday, Jan. 15, and Nevada Democrats caucus on Jan. 19 -- but South Carolina's contests offer a cachet the others can't match.

South Carolina Republicans hold the South's first primary Jan. 19. Since 1980, no Republican has lost the state and gone on to win the nomination.

"We have the perfect political storm brewing here now," S.C. GOP Chairman Katon Dawson said Tuesday night. "South Carolina voters have never paid attention to New Hampshire and Iowa."

A week later, Democrats get their first real test among African-American voters who until now have split their allegiances between Obama and Clinton.

"South Carolina will be the biggest donnybrook you've ever seen," said Don Fowler of Columbia, a former Democratic national chairman and Clinton supporter. "This is a totally new ball game. It'll be the damnedest campaign you've ever seen."

Candidates are already descending on the Palmetto State.

McCain campaigns today in Charleston. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee will be in Spartanburg and Greenville. All the major GOP candidates will be in Myrtle Beach on Thursday for a nationally televised debate. Fred Thompson, a former Tennessee senator, didn't wait for Tuesday's results. He arrived Monday.

Edwards, the South Carolina native and former North Carolina senator who finished third Tuesday, has "homecoming" rallies today in Clemson and Columbia. Obama campaigns Thursday in Charleston.

Before Tuesday, polls showed Obama expanding his lead among South Carolina Democrats after his win in last week's Iowa caucuses.

Even with Clinton's win, "The momentum from [New Hampshire] will just kind of wash over into South Carolina," said Cleveland Sellers, director of the African American Studies Program program at the University of South Carolina.

Black voters will make up around half of the Democratic electorate. Through December, Obama and Clinton jockeyed for the lead in polls.

In 2004, South Carolina gave Edwards his only primary win. This time he has consistently trailed his two top rivals, particularly among black voters. A September poll found he had the support of just 3 percent of black voters in South Carolina.

For McCain, South Carolina once again looms large. After winning New Hampshire in 2000, the Vietnam veteran waded into an ambush. He lost to George W. Bush in a bitter primary that even saw fliers accusing him of fathering illegitimate children. Since then, many Bush supporters have rallied around their former adversary.

McCain, of Arizona, faces tough competition, particularly from former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. Though Huckabee finished third in New Hampshire after winning the Iowa caucuses, he's expected to benefit from South Carolina's large base of evangelical voters.

Thompson, who had led in a Clemson poll as recently as November, appears to have faded. Woodard said Thompson has "everything at stake" in South Carolina.

"If he finishes poor here, he's finished," he said. "This is his Gettysburg."

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