Dylan wasn’t there talk of a home/home with Cinci? I would prefer if Michigan didn’t do these preseason tournaments there’s no guarantee of getting a good draw of challenging non conference opponents.
Part of me prefers what Kentucky does they don’t play in these tourneys but play enough teams to build a good resume.
Of course part of me is frustrated why Michigan only gets 1 good non conference home game this year. Of course they had the ACC/B1G challenge but NC State has come to Crisler twice, and now Michigan has gone there twice.
Pretty much the only way to get good games these days is play in preseason tournaments. Kentucky has the Champions Classic which helps and really what UK has done is just setup a bunch of neutral site games on its own.
I’ve got on my future schedules page that U-M will play a home-and-home with UC between 2015-16 and 2018-19.
So two of the next three years that should kick into play
There are very few true home-and-homes in college hoops these days though. Take a look at the schedules. If you play Gavitt, ACC, a tourney and then maybe a one off Barclays game or something like that, that’s about it.
Michigan should play ~3 top 25 teams, and two other top 100 teams. Not awful.
I gather that the ACC opponent is in part influenced by the previous year’s performance. Hopefully with a strong year they can play a really good team next time around (my fingers are crossed for a long-overdue UNC matchup).
I hear you on the rarity of home-and-homes although Michigan has had great series with Arizona, Kansas and UConn in recent memory. As for the Barclay’s game, I love it, although Michigan has scheduled it with non-vintage-year Stanford and WVU teams – maybe they can aim higher and try to arrange something with a perennial power like KU, UK or Arizona.
Also – if the NMU game doesn’t count towards the win total for tournament selection purposes, why schedule a D-II game in the regular season? If you need an extra tune-up, why not just play a second exhibition game?