Big East/20 games/Schedule Strategy

[BFieldHusky]

Very excited for this once we join the conference. Playing 20 regular season games plus conference tournament games against Top 150 competition will do wonders for our strength of schedule and NET. I am curious how Fox/Big East will schedule these 2 additional games? For example, the Big Ten played 20 games last year, and had 2 conference games played at the end of November/early December. Big East could do this, or could play these 2 games toward the middle of December before conference play would typically start. With 11 teams in the Big East, 1 team will always have a "bye." The ACC, going to 20 games this year, is having teams open their season with ACC games this year, but that might be more of a product of launching the ACC Network.

Will be interesting what Hurley's strategy is now OOC. Obviously we had to load up in the American, and often played our hardest opponents in November. While it is still good to play some national teams OOC (Florida, Indiana at MSG this year) there also needs to be a balance as we will only have 10-11 OOC games now. And remember the Big East has the Big 12 challenge, and the Gavitt games.

In 2020-2021 for example we could have the 20 Big East games, the road game against Florida, a Big 12 challenge game, and a Gavitt game. There is 23 games already scheduled. We may see UConn not play in 3 day early season tournaments as much with this new schedule.

 

[Big East Fa]

It will not be in the middle of Demember. That is exam week. I could see opening week with a conference game. College basketball is trying to create buzz in the major shadow of the NFL and College Football.

 

[Tyler2Rings]

I wonder if the BE will stick us with the final week bye our first year or 2

 

[UConnJim]

The NCAA rules are 29 regular season games or 27 regular season games plus a tournament. The Big East has the Big 12 Challenge (10 teams) and the Gavitt games (8 teams), so UConn would play probably 21 or 22 required BE games per year, although the Gavitt games expire in 2022, but they could be renewed.

Let's say UConn has 22 games scheduled and half are at home or 11 games. They have to schedule another 9 games or 7 games plus a tournament. The problem is that UConn typically only plays 10 to 12 road games per year, so UConn is looking at potentially going to 13 to 14 road games per year moving to the Big East. Thus, scheduling non-conference away games will become very precious.

One last thought. It seems all conferences are moving to a 20 game conference season. This will make scheduling out of conference games very difficult if you want a home and home. It's now more apparent that UConn basketball could not remain in the AAC if a 20 game conference schedule was enacted as UConn would have gained an additional conference home and road game. That would have made home attendance even more difficult. With 11 teams now in the AAC, a round robin schedule equals 20 games.

 

[VCE]

I think the 20 + 2 game commitment will make the prospect of offering UConn games up in exchange for football help more difficult, but not impossible. You’re essentially trading 2 cupcakes for either the extra 2 BE games or the challenge games.

SOS will definitely be better, gate receipts should be better overall as well, despite fewer home games.

 

[McLovin]

So if I understand correctly, in 2020 we will have either 6 OOC games or 4 OOC games + a tourney (assuming we are participating in both BE challenges) since we are already lined-up to play at Florida. If we can get into a high caliber tournament (is the PK85 in 2020?) we could schedule 4 cupcake home games in early Nov / Dec, but that would be a daunting schedule. Going to be real interesting to see if we skip a tourney in 2020 to get the 6 OOC games and try to just pick up one more high caliber opponent either at home / neutral site (Syracuse in MSG...?)

 

[Dooooooomed]

So if I understand correctly, in 2020 we will have either 6 OOC games or 4 OOC games + a tourney (assuming we are participating in both BE challenges) since we are already lined-up to play at Florida. If we can get into a high caliber tournament (is the PK85 in 2020?) we could schedule 4 cupcake home games in early Nov / Dec, but that would be a daunting schedule. Going to be real interesting to see if we skip a tourney in 2020 to get the 6 OOC games and try to just pick up one more high caliber opponent either at home / neutral site (Syracuse in MSG...?)

Bumheim already said he just doesn't have room on the schedule for UConn anymore. Plus, no need to give Cuse a MSG game going forward. We'll have plenty.