On Tuesday, the Florida Atlantic men’s basketball team announced their non-conference schedule via Instagram.
FAU will open their season at Wintrust Arena in Chicago, Illinois, where they will face Loyola University Chicago in the Barstool Sports Invitational. This is the second year that Barstool Sports will host this Invitational, which brings in four-teams to compete in the opening week of the college basketball season. The Invitational will also host a matchup between Arizona State University and Mississippi State University. Mississippi State played and won in the very first Barstool Sports Invitational.
The Owls will then face two familiar foes at home, with matchups against Eastern Michigan University on Nov. 14, and Bryant University on Nov. 18. FAU defeated Eastern Michigan 101-73, and Bryant 85-74, both last season.
The team will then travel to Orlando, Florida to compete in the ESPN Events Invitational, hosted at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. The tournament will feature eight different schools including FAU, and looks to have major AP Top 25 ranking implications. FAU will be the first school coming out of a Final Four appearance to be in the invitational since Villanova University in 2018.
FAU will start the Invitational against Butler University on Nov. 23. If the Owls win this game, they will face the winner of Pennsylvania State University vs. Texas A&M University on Nov. 24. If the Owls also win this game, then they will face the winner of the opposite side of the tournament bracket on Nov. 26.
After that competition, FAU will host the inaugural “Field of 68 Classic.” The Field of 68 is a “college basketball-dedicated media network,” named after the 68 teams that compete in the annual NCAA Division 1 Men’s Basketball tournament. The focus of the Classic is to showcase “three of the top mid-major programs in the country.”
FAU will kick off the Classic by playing against Liberty University on Nov. 30, and end by playing against the College of Charleston on Dec. 2. Charleston and Liberty will also play one another at Eleanor R. Baldwin Arena on Dec. 1.
After this, the Owls will travel back to Madison Square Garden in New York City to compete against the University of Illinois on Dec. 5 in the “Jimmy V Classic.” This Classic will be a double-header event, also featuring a match between the University of Connecticut (the reigning National Champions) and the University of North Carolina.
The Jimmy V Classic honors the life of long-time men’s college basketball coach Jim Valvano, who passed away from cancer. The Classic raises money and awareness for the V Foundation for Cancer Research. This will be FAU’s first appearance back at Madison Square Garden since the clinching of their Final Four appearance against Kansas State University last season.
After a long series of Invitationals and Classics, FAU will host former-conference opponent and school-rival Florida International University on Dec. 13. FAU holds a six-game win streak against FIU, dating back to Jan. 14, 2021.
Following this, FAU will travel to Springfield, Massachusetts to compete in the “Basketball Hall of Fame Classic,” hosted at MassMutual Center, where the game of basketball was created. Here, the Owls will play against St. Bonaventure University on Dec. 16.
The next non-conference opponent match up will come against the University of Arizona in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Dec. 23. The game will be played at T-Mobile Arena.
The final non-conference opponent on FAU’s schedule will be fellow Florida school, Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU), at an away game on Dec. 30. FGCU has a history of their own when it comes to a Cinderella March Madness run–in 2013 they went on to the Sweet 16 as a 15th seed.
JD Delcastillo is a contributing writer with the University Press. For information regarding this or other stories email him at [email protected] or reach out on Instagram @jd.delcastillo
