We play 18 conference games.
Memphis, Wichita St.,UConn, and Tulane we play once each.
The other 7 conference opponents we play twice each.
How is this all determined? Does not at all work like our Football schedule does.
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Good question. I think they rotate who we play without much thought beyond that. I wish they’d do like the women and make sure better teams played better teams twice and the teams lower in the standings played teams lower in the standings. Need all the boost we can get.
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I would think Tulane, SMU, and Tulsa would be twice a year games for us year in and year out due to our proximity and history with them. I was surprised we only played Tulane once this year. It’s good for us though because they are helping no one’s SOS. Tulane’s fall and USF’s rise are two of the biggest AAC storylines this year.
I don’t know if it’s doable in the AAC based on cost, TV partners etc, but CUSA has an interesting idea they are using this year. Their final four games of the regular season are set during the season. Essentially they divide the league into “pods”. Teams 1-5 play each other, teams 6-10 play each other and teams 11-15 play each other the final four games before their tourney. I presume this is to strengthen the metrics and rankings of their top teams.
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Unbalanced schedules are one of the worst results of the mega conferences. When I was growing up in ACC country the double round robin was standard in every major conference in the country. In the ACC, you never played anybody a second time until you had played everybody the first time. The standings at the end of the season meant so much more because they weren’t influenced nearly as much by who you played only once and where you played them. The old days are never coming back, but the closer you can get to a true double round robin the better.
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In some conferences teams don’t play one another for more than four years. Imagine that, being part of a class that never plays ALL of its conference opponents. Truly sad. That’s “big time” college athletics though.
So who is The Wizard behind the curtain who decides who we play once and who we play twice?