What is the best format? Most would agree to play home/home with the 6 division opponents. That s 12 games. After that what is the best plan? And should the women s teams play the same opponents as the men and play doubleheaders?

(02-12-2022 10:16 PM)GaSoEagle Wrote:  What is the best format? Most would agree to play home/home with the 6 division opponents. That s 12 games. After that what is the best plan? And should the women s teams play the same opponents as the men and play doubleheaders?

I don't expect divisions in basketball. We'll operate similar to the SEC, everyone will have 3 or 4 teams within a reasonable geographic distance that they'll always play twice and then they'll play another two teams twice on a rotating basis.

I think the first big question to answer is 18 or 20 league games.

I wouldn t be surprised to see 20 conference games or women s/men s doubleheaders

(02-12-2022 10:31 PM)GaSoEagle Wrote:  I wouldn t be surprised to see 20 conference games or women s/men s doubleheaders

Only go to 20 conference games if the coaches okay it and are fine with playing some of those games before Christmas. Probably also depends on the dates of the conference tournament. This year's is finishing up 6 days before Selection Sunday, which means one less weekend to play regular season games, compared to when it was in NOLA the championship game was on Selection Sunday.

I can say this:

When it comes to scheduling or anything else, no group is more self serving than men's basketball coaches.

I'm going to guess they stay at 18....but the women only play 16. (at least this year).

There's also the question of doubleheaders vs. mirror scheduling. The men's coaches hate doubleheaders and they are the ones that push for the mirror.

What happens in the future depends on who is shouting the loudest I guess.

I would like 20 just to eliminate 2 non-DI games off our schedule. I know we won't do divisions but playing your "division" round-robin and then 6/7 from the other "division" would create a nice little 18 game schedule.

The format has changed almost every year since 2014. We've done doubleheaders, mirror, equitable travel, divisions, etc. And every year, we hear about coaches whining about the schedule.

I think what we're doing now is fine. Number of league games won't cut down on sub-D1 games unless a hard and fast rule is put in place.

(02-14-2022 11:25 AM)Troy_Fan_15 Wrote:  I would like 20 just to eliminate 2 non-DI games off our schedule. I know we won't do divisions but playing your "division" round-robin and then 6/7 from the other "division" would create a nice little 18 game schedule.

I would be perfectly fine with 20 conf games if it means eliminating some non D1 games as USM usually ends up playing 2-3 of those per year. There is one (William Carey) that we will probably keep regardless as its a NAIA school 5 minutes down the road from here. If nothing else they would be our exhibition game as it usually draws a decent crowd for us early on in the season.