The UH basketball out-of-conference schedule was released on Monday with few surprises yet few marquee games. This isn’t a schedule to challenge for a top-three seed in the tournament. I hoped for a few more compelling games.
But there’s a reason this is being released the day of the anticipated red/white scrimmage. To bury it.
My Quick OOC Takeaways:
- The only Saturday/Sunday home game is December 15th against Oklahoma State.
- BYU is a Friday night at Fertitta on November 15.
- The Hawaii trip will start on Friday, December 20th with a flight to Honolulu. After practice Saturday, the Coogs face the Portland Pilots on Sunday at 2 p.m. and either Georgia Tech or Boise State on Monday. The tournament ends with a Christmas day game vs. TBA.
- The rest of the home games are two Tuesday games (Alabama St, HBU), two games on Wednesday (Texas State, UT-Arlington), and a Thursday game (UTEP). Bleck.
- After 11 home OOC games (7 at Fertitta) last season, this year’s schedule has just 7 OOC home games total. That’s not ideal.
- Oklahoma State (72) was the highest-rated team UH will face at home (according to last year’s NET). BYU (89) was top 100 as well.
- UH will make a roadie to Oregon to play the Ducks – Oregon finished 41st in the NET last year. They are the only Quad 1 game (based on last season’s results) the Cougars will play OOC. South Carolina finished 79th in the NET last season.
- Alabama State (330), Portland (326), UTEP (290), HBU (292) are all schedule killers.
I don’t love this schedule – it feels like a James Dickey special. I wish there were more challenging games on it for a team that should be pretty salty.