2026-2027 Season Schedule Thread

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psyclone

Hall of Famer
I don't have a paid subscription to Mook's blog, but did get this abridged email and thought it might be of interest:

Atlantic 10 vs. Power Conferences​

A look at the Atlantic 10’s last five seasons in non-conference play and the NCAA Tournament​

​
Here is a look at how the conference has matched up against the Big East, SEC, Big 12, Big Ten, and ACC over the 2021-22 through 2025-26 window.
Overall, the A-10 went 58-101 against those five leagues. By opponent conference, the A-10 was 20-26 vs. the ACC, 16-25 vs. the Big East, 8-19 vs. the SEC, 7-16 vs. the Big 12, and 7-15 vs. the Big Ten.
Best A-10 wins by season
2021-22: This was the A-10’s strongest year in the sample, with a 19-21 combined record against the five leagues. The headline win was Dayton over No. 3 Kansas, 74-73, followed by Richmond over No. 13 Iowa, 67-63, in the NCAA Tournament, Dayton over No. 18 Virginia Tech, 62-57, and Davidson over Alabama, 79-78.
2022-23: The A-10 dropped to 8-21, with fewer high-end wins. The best results were Saint Louis over Providence, 76-73, Loyola Chicago over Clemson, 76-58, vcu over Pittsburgh, 71-67, and vcu over Vanderbilt, 70-65.
2023-24: The A-10 went 11-21, but it had a few strong wins at the top. Dayton beat No. 16 St. John’s, 88-81, Duquesne beat No. 24 BYU, 71-67, in the NCAA Tournament, and Saint Joseph’s beat Villanova, 78-65.
2024-25: The A-10 went 12-18, and this year included one of its best single wins of the whole period: Saint Joseph’s over No. 7 Texas Tech, 78-77. Dayton also had a strong run with wins over Marquette, 71-63, UConn, 85-67, and Northwestern, 71-66.
2025-26: The A-10 went 8-20, with its best win coming in the NCAA Tournament when vcu beat North Carolina, 82-78. Saint Louis added a strong SEC win over Georgia, 102-77, while Dayton beat Florida State, 97-69, and Marquette, 77-71.
In short, the A-10’s best moments were high-quality but sporadic: Dayton’s 2021 win over Kansas, Richmond’s NCAA upset of Iowa, Duquesne’s NCAA win over BYU, Saint Joseph’s win over Texas Tech, and vcu’s NCAA win over North Carolina stand out most. Compared with the Big East profile we looked at earlier, the A-10 had fewer total wins and less year-to-year consistency, but it still produced several top-tier wins against power-conference opponents.
NCAA Tournament Bids
The NCAA announced the expansion of March Madness to 76 teams. Some remain hopeful that this will benefit a few mid-major conference but I have my doubts.
Here is a look at Atlantic 10 bids from 2022 through 2026.
The Atlantic 10 had 8 total bids and went 5-8 in NCAA Tournament games.
The A-10’s best tournament years in this window were 2024 and 2026, when it earned 2 bids and won 2 games each year. Its weakest years were 2023 and 2025, when it was a one-bid league and went 0-1 both times.
The best cumulative non-conference record by winning percentage belonged to St. Bonaventure, which went 46-18, a .719 winning percentage, over the five-season span. Dayton had the most total nonconference wins, going 49-22, followed by St. Bonaventure at 46-18, vcu at 46-25, and George Mason at 45-20.
By season, the top A-10 non-conference team records were Davidson at 9-3 in 2021-22, Fordham at 12-1 in 2022-23, George Mason, George Washington, and Saint Joseph’s tied at 10-2 in 2023-24, Rhode Island at 10-1 in 2024-25, and Saint Louis at 12-2 in 2025-26.
 
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mkaufman1

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GIVING DAY 2023
Hopefully we will get back on UVAs schedule sometime soon. It certainly has been a while.

Judging from how our first h/h that was coordinated was with High Point, I suspect our schedule will be much improved this year which is a good thing.
 
P

psyclone

Hall of Famer
Mook blog on Schertz & SLU:

Josh Schertz Has Given Saint Louis a New Basketball Identity

Saint Louis did not hire Josh Schertz just to stabilize the program. The Billikens hired him to change what Saint Louis basketball looked like, and two seasons of data show that the change has been dramatic. The program has moved from a team that could score but could not stop enough people into one of the Atlantic 10’s most efficient offensive programs, with a defensive profile strong enough to support a real league-title push.
​
Schertz was named Saint Louis’ head coach in April 2024 after taking Indiana State to a 32-7 season, the Missouri Valley regular-season title, and the 2024 NIT championship game. He replaced Travis Ford after Saint Louis finished 13-20 overall and 5-13 in the A-10 in 2023-24, a collapse that ended Ford’s eight-year tenure.
The raw before-and-after is blunt. In the final pre-Schertz regular season, Saint Louis went 12-19 in the regular season and 5-13 in A-10 play. In Schertz’s first regular season, the Billikens improved to 18-13 and 11-7 in the league. By year two, they were 27-4 in the regular season and 15-3 in the A-10, with conference tournament games excluded.
The baseline Schertz inherited
The 2023-24 Billikens were not hopeless offensively. They scored 75.0 points per game in the regular season, shot 36.9 percent from three, and had a 51.9 percent effective field-goal rate. The problem was that the offense did not matter enough because the defense gave too much back.
Saint Louis allowed 79.5 points per game in the 2023-24 regular season, with a 113.8 defensive rating and a 53.7 percent opponent effective field-goal rate in the saved game-log data. In A-10 games, the defensive picture was worse: opponents scored 82.5 points per game, the Billikens’ defensive rating rose to 118.2, and opponents shot 55.1 percent eFG.
That is the context that matters. Schertz did not inherit a program that needed one more shot-maker. He inherited a program that needed a complete identity reset: better shot quality, more connected offense, fewer defensive breakdowns, and a system that could survive A-10 play.
The jump was not just about pace or a few more wins. From 2023-24 to 2025-26, Saint Louis improved by 12.8 points per game, improved its eFG% by 8.5 percentage points, raised its assist rate per made field goal by nearly 10 percentage points, lowered opponent scoring by 10.4 points per game, and improved net rating by 32.4 points per 100 estimated possessions in the saved regular-season game-log sample.
That is what a system change looks like. The Billikens did not simply recruit over the problem. They became a different kind of team.
The offense became Schertz’s signature
Schertz’s offensive reputation came from Indiana State, where the 2023-24 Sycamores led the Missouri Valley and ranked among the top 10 nationally in scoring offense before he took the Saint Louis job. At Saint Louis, the early returns show the same philosophical shift: spacing, passing, shot quality, and two-point efficiency.
The 2024-25 transition year already showed the new shape. Saint Louis’ full-season field-goal percentage jumped from No. 165 in 2023-24 to No. 43 in 2024-25, and its two-point percentage rank jumped from No. 234 to No. 3. By 2025-26, the offense had become elite nationally. Saint Louis ranked No. 12 in points per game, No. 8 in field-goal percentage, No. 18 in two-point percentage, and No. 30 in three-point percentage. In the saved regular-season game logs, the Billikens averaged 87.8 points per game and posted a 60.4 percent eFG% in 2025-26.
The assist numbers are the best shorthand for the style change. Saint Louis assisted on 49.7 percent of made field goals in 2023-24, then moved to 57.4 percent in 2024-25 and 59.5 percent in 2025-26 in the saved game-log data. That is not just “better offense.” It is a more connected offense.
The defense changed almost as much
The easy version of the Schertz story is that he fixed the offense. The fuller version is that he also made Saint Louis playable defensively. The Billikens allowed 79.5 points per game in 2023-24, then dropped to 70.1 in 2024-25 and 69.1 in 2025-26 in the saved regular-season game-log data.
The shot-quality prevention changed even more. Opponent eFG% fell from 53.7 percent in 2023-24 to 47.9 percent in 2024-25 and 43.8 percent in 2025-26. The defensive rating moved from 113.8 to 101.8 to 95.9 over the same three-season span.
That defensive improvement is why the program-level change looks sustainable. High-end offense can win nights. High-end offense with a defense that no longer leaks efficient looks can win a league.
The A-10 translation is the real proof
The best evidence of Schertz’s impact is not the nonconference scoring explosions. It is how quickly the Billikens became a different A-10 team.
Saint Louis went from being outscored by 6.7 points per game in A-10 play in 2023-24 to outscoring league opponents by 12.1 points per game in 2025-26. The A-10 eFG% rose from 52.2 percent to 60.8 percent, while opponent eFG% fell from 55.1 percent to 45.7 percent.
That is the part Atlantic 10 fans should care about. Plenty of teams can build inflated nonconference numbers. Schertz’s second Saint Louis team carried the offense into league play and defended well enough for the numbers to matter.
The program perception changed too
The statistical jump changed the way Saint Louis was discussed. ESPN reported in March 2026 that Schertz had agreed to a contract extension, and the story noted that the Billikens were 28-4 at the time after an A-10 quarterfinal win, matching a school record for wins. The same report said Schertz was 46-19 through his first two seasons at Saint Louis and had already taken the Billikens to the NIT in 2025.
That matters because Saint Louis has often had resources, ambition, and flashes of success. What Schertz has added is a clearer basketball thesis. The Billikens are no longer defined by whether they can assemble enough talent to win individual matchups. They are defined by whether opponents can solve the spacing, passing, and efficiency problem Saint Louis now presents every night.
What still needs watching
The transformation is real, but it is not complete. Saint Louis’ defensive profile improved without becoming a steals-and-blocks machine, as ESPN ranked the Billikens No. 266 in steals per game and No. 230 in blocks per game in 2025-26. That means the defense depends more on positioning, shot suppression, and rebounding than on overwhelming athletic disruption.
The other watch point is whether the 2025-26 shooting level can be sustained. A 60.4 percent regular-season eFG% and 40.5 percent three-point rate are elite numbers, and even a small regression would narrow margins in the A-10. The good news for Saint Louis is that the offense is not only threes. The Billikens ranked No. 18 nationally in two-point percentage in 2025-26, which suggests the shot-quality foundation is broader than one hot perimeter season.
The takeaway
Josh Schertz has changed Saint Louis by changing both the math and the feel of the program. The math says the Billikens moved from a negative net-rating team to a +25.9 regular-season net-rating team in two years, from a 5-13 A-10 team to a 15-3 A-10 team, and from a middling shooting team to one of the nation’s most efficient offenses in ESPN’s team-stat ranks.
The feel says the same thing in basketball language. Saint Louis now plays with a recognizable offensive structure, a higher passing baseline, better shot quality, and a defensive floor that lets the offense win big instead of merely keeping games close. That is not a minor improvement. That is a program reset.
 
Old Man

Old Man

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Keep in mind, we also have ODU on the schedule this coming season. We better not trip over this game.
 
P

psyclone

Hall of Famer
Mook blog on Mason-High Point:

When Winners Meet: George Mason Heads to High Point​

Two of the sport’s steadiest non-power programs collide after combining for 80-plus wins over the last two seasons​

May 30
George Mason will head to High Point on Dec. 2, 2026, in what should be one of the more interesting nonconference games on the mid-major calendar next season. It will be the first meeting between the programs, and it comes with both teams carrying the kind of recent track record that gives the matchup more weight than a typical December game.
​
High Point announced the game this week as part of its 2026-27 nonconference schedule. The Panthers’ release also doubled as a reminder of what George Mason has become under Tony Skinn: the Patriots went 23-10 overall and 11-7 in the Atlantic 10 in 2025-26, reached the NIT after the A-10 tournament, and have posted three straight 20-win seasons during Skinn’s tenure.
That kind of consistency is not easy to find in the A-10, where winning usually means surviving a league full of experienced guards, physical frontcourts and few off nights. Mason has done more than hold its place. High Point noted that the Patriots are one of only three A-10 programs to finish in the NET top 100 in each of the last three seasons, which helps explain why this game lands as a real test for a Panthers team that has been building similar momentum in the Big South.
High Point has its own case as one of the sport’s more reliable mid-major winners. The Panthers finished 29-6 in 2024-25 and ended that season 82nd in KenPom, a top-100 finish that backed up their regular-season success with strong predictive metrics. In 2025-26, they took another step, earning a No. 12 seed in the NCAA tournament, beating Wisconsin 83-82 for the first NCAA tournament win in program history, and then falling 94-88 to Arkansas in the second round.
The raw win totals are what stand out first. High Point went 29-6 in 2024-25, then 31-4 in 2025-26, giving the Panthers a 60-10 record across the last two seasons. George Mason has not hit that same volume because the A-10 is a tougher league night to night, but the Patriots have still stacked three straight 20-win seasons and finished 23-10 last year while staying inside the NET top 100 for the third consecutive season.
That is what gives this game its edge. Mason brings the profile of a proven upper-tier A-10 program, one that has been stable under a coach with deep ties to the school and clear year-over-year results. High Point brings a program that has gone from rising Big South contender to March winner, all while sustaining the kind of offensive efficiency and weekly poll presence that usually signal something sturdier than a one-year run.
There is also a scheduling point here that matters. Games like this are increasingly valuable for programs outside the power conferences because they offer résumé value without requiring a high-major opponent. For George Mason, a road game against a team coming off a 31-win season and an NCAA tournament win has obvious upside. For High Point, getting Mason at home is another chance to show that the program’s recent rise belongs in the same conversation as the A-10’s most dependable contenders.
By the time Dec. 2 arrives, both teams could again be expected to compete near the top of their leagues. That makes this less about novelty than quality. High Point and George Mason have both spent the last few years proving they can win regularly, and the reward is a matchup that should feel like a real event well before conference play starts.​
 
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