Vitória SC

Handball at Vitória SC traces back to the 1960s, when the football club added the sport as one of its departments and its players first took the court at Campo da Amorosa. That section did not survive the end of the 1994/1995 season, when it was shut down, and Guimarães went without a Vitória handball team for the better part of three decades.

The revival came for the 2020/2021 campaign, and the climb that followed was fast rather than gradual. Vitória won the Campeonato Nacional da 3.ª Divisão in its first season back, earning promotion to the Second Division, then took that division too in 2022/2023, moving the club into Andebol 1, the top flight, for 2023/2024. Home matches are played in front of 2,500 seats at the Pavilhão Unidade Vimaranense. Eduardo Fernandes coached the side through the promotion run and into its first seasons among the elite.

The step up to the top division has since carried the club onto a wider stage: Rafael Andrade and Freddy Lafontán were called up to the Cape Verde and Cuban national teams respectively for the 2025 World Championship, a first for players from Vitória's handball ranks. On the domestic side, Tiago Sousa has been the team's top scorer through the 2025/26 season. As in football, the fixture against ABC Braga is treated as the Derby do Minho.

What returned in 2020 was, in effect, a department that Guimarães had lost once already — the same sport, revived under the same crest that had first fielded it back in the 1960s.