FARGO – The Summit League gave a glimpse into what the conference schedule has entailed for men’s and women’s basketball on Wednesday.
Basketball analyst Jeff Goodman broke the story on Twitter.
Summit league schedule starts Jan 2. Two games vs. opponent at one home site. 16 total games.
– Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanHoops) October 14, 2020
The traditional home-and-home schedule will go out the door for this upcoming season.
As an example, North Dakota State would travel to North Dakota and play the Fighting Hawks twice inside the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center for the regular-season contests.
“Teams will play on back-to-back days,” said Summit League assistant commissioner for communications Ryan Powell. “Each team is going to receive a bye, we have nine teams in our league so there will be one bye week for everybody.”
Reducing the potential exposure to the coronavirus are some of the reasons for the modifications.
“With COVID-19 its about the safety and welfare of our student-athletes and coaches, we have a lot of game personnel that are going to have to work games and trying to limit the amount of time that they’re in the gym and that travel cuts down on a full trip doing the back-to-back,” said Powell. “It’s 2020 so everything is subject to change but that’s where we’re at right now and hopefully we get that full schedule out here in the coming days.”
North Dakota State won the Summit League men’s basketball tournament last season with the University of South Dakota coming out on top on the women’s side.
2020-21 #SummitMBB and #SummitWBB schedule notes:
16-game schedule
– Summit Hoops (@summithoops) October 14, 2020
SUMMIT LEAGUE TEAMS
North Dakota State
North Dakota
South Dakota State
South Dakota
Denver
Kansas City
Omaha
Oral Roberts
Western Illinois
*St. Thomas will join beginning in the 2021-2022 season.
