Syracuse men’s basketball adds Green Bay to 2020-21 schedule

I’m not so certain we’re going to have a 2020-21 college basketball season. But until we know that’s not the case, might as well keep acting like we will.

With that in mind, the Syracuse Orange men’s basketball team announced on Thursday that they’ll be hosting the Green Bay Phoenix as part of the upcoming season’s non-conference schedule. We knew Green Bay was going to be on the slate already given previous formats of the Gotham Classic event, which both SU and the Phoenix are in. But now we have a date for when they actually visit the Dome: December 8.

SU last faced Green Bay — back when they were still #BRANDed as “UW-Green Bay” — in 2000, winning a nice 69-57 game at home. They also beat the Phoenix in the 1994 NCAA Tournament, in a 64-59 game that featured Dick Bennett (father of Virginia coach Tony Bennett) on the opposite sideline.

As part of the Gotham Classic, Syracuse will host Green Bay (December 8), Mercer (date TBD) and Jacksonville State (not yet confirmed, but will happen on date TBD), and also suit up vs. the LSU Tigers at Madison Square Garden on Saturday, December 19.

So that accounts for four opponents, and our annual matchup with the Georgetown Hoyas makes five. Syracuse will also host UMBC on November 10, so that’s six foes so far with five to go. One of those will be SU’s ACC/Big Ten Challenge opponent, then the other four are a bit more up in the air. Colgate and Cornell have typically filled two slots. The Orange could opt to add more in-state options as well to reduce travel, potentially, given what’s going on in the world.