Pac-12 Men’s Basketball Pairings Released

It’s been a long and winding road as we inch closer to the start of the Pac-12 basketball season but we finally have some more detailed information for conference games. The Huskies will play the previously announced pair of conference games in December and then the rest of the pairings have been released. The exact dates of the games outside of the first two as well as the TV assignments/tip-off times for all of them will come out later.

The Dawgs will begin the year traveling to Utah which is where they blew a big late lead and lost a heartbreaker by a single point a year ago. Then they host the Oregon Ducks...where they blew a big late lead and lost a heartbreaker in overtime a year ago (it was a rough year last year).

For the first time the Pac-12 is moving to a 20-game conference slate as opposed to the traditional 18 games. That means we’re not quite back to the days of having a true home and away Round Robin schedule but things are even closer to that method now with only 2 schools not getting return trips. That means the only teams the Huskies aren’t playing twice are Colorado who only come to Seattle and Oregon State with the only game in Corvallis. The Beavers should be one of the worst teams in the conference this year without Tres Tinkle while the Buffaloes will likely be around 7-8th in the standings.

The pandemic has obviously had a major impact on the way that teams are thinking about their schedules. Coach Hopkins confirmed earlier in the week that planned games against Auburn, Oklahoma, and Gonzaga had all been cancelled and the Huskies would be playing a more regional schedule. It looked like maybe there was a chance the Gonzaga game could be rescheduled after the Orlando multi-team event was cancelled but the Bulldogs instead agreed to travel to play the aforementioned Auburn as well as Kansas.

Based on the most recent information it appears the Huskies will have games against Portland State, Cal State Fullerton, and one other team during a multi-team event over Thanksgiving as well as a game against Seattle. The Dawgs are unlikely to find a non-conference game against a premium opponent which may be a good thing as they deal with a very new look team.

With the status of senior Naz Carter still unknown the Huskies are facing the possibility of entering next season with only 4 of the 9 players that appeared in their last game returning to the court. Of course, the Huskies do bring back PG Quade Green who was ruled academically ineligible for the second half of the season and was arguably their second best player when in the lineup. They also expect to add formerly local transfers J’Raan Brooks, Erik Stevenson, and Cole Bajema to the lineup. Brooks will certainly suit up this year while the Huskies need one last stamp of approval to announce that both Stevenson and Bajema are eligible to compete immediately.