A10 and Mountain West Announce MBB Challenge Series for 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 Seasons

https://twitter.com/A10MBB/status/1075813079194193920

http://www.atlantic10.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=31600&ATCLID=211784432

Thoughts? I like this

Bring on San Diego State and give Hartwell his homecoming.

I am not sure but I don't think thats the closest MW school to LA

San Diego is closer than Fresno or San Jose. Vegas is pretty close, but I’m pretty sure San Diego is physically closer. I wouldn’t call it a homecoming, though.

I stand corrected... just did the math and I also thought Long Beach St was in MW... not true

I like it, also glad it gives us a chance to have a better season next year to increase the quality of our potential matchup in 2020/2021 (10 games per year, so 1 MW and 4 A10 teams will be left out).

I hope they come up with a creative name regarding the conference members being located on the opposite sides of the Country, like TuPac v Biggie or something like that.

The LBC I’d consider a homecoming. You can get there on the light rail from downtown LA.

The way I see it, if family/friends can make a 2 hour drive to watch someone play, that is considered homecoming. San Diego is about 2 hours from LA (on a good day).

Well, obviously I’d prefer playing at UCLA over any of the other SoCal options...but who knows if we can swing that one.

By the way, looks like our bottom 4 teams will be left out of this. If we want to compete (and get a good game) we better shape up and fast.

If this series was this season and done the way I've proposed (like the old BracketBuster model), now would be the time the conferences would be setting up the games a few weeks from now. Anyone not want to see a Dayton-SD St match up? How about URI-Utah St, Colorado St-VCU and Boise St-Saint Louis. Now those have NCAA bid implications. Instead, these games will be played in Nov/Dec and get lost in the shuffle. Maybe some day

Yep...and guess who doesn't get a game?

Who wouldn’t want to see Mason vs Wyoming? Oh, wait...

Giving this more thought, because I'm exhausted by reading multiple fire, keep, extend threads.
If I were the A10 and MWC, I would NOT match up Dayton and SD St in my bracketbuster scheduling model. Follow my logic. Both teams are locks to get into the tourney. While them playing this weekend or next would be an awesome game to watch, isnt there more to gain if Utah St played Dayton and won? USU is on the bubble and has already completed their season series with SD St. Playing Dayton would give them another top 10 opportunity. Same for Rhode Island. Match them up with SDSU and for another top 10 opportunity. This would be very unconventional but an interesting strategy by the conferences to try and get more teams into the dance.

What an interesting take. In a non-power 5 League, the point of these matchups is similar to bracket Busters. Teams get a chance to increase their profile in advance of selection Sunday. But these two top teams who absolutely do not need to increase their profile are actually just being set up for one of them to kind of hurt the other one.

Well, a, they don’t start playing until next season, and SDSt and Dayton don’t play each other

SDSt are playing St. Louis and Dayton will play Nevada.

But I do like the idea of doing it BracketBuster style instead of deciding the season before.

Correct, but I was using this year as an example of what the brackbuster model might give us.

And in my make believe scenario for this year, it only works because SDSU and Dayton are clearly locks. That may not be the case every year.

To the A10 execs reading this board, I'm waiving my consulting fee. This one is on the house....

Hell, the A10 and MWC could even produce and stream a selection show similar to ESPN and talk about the teams and show highlights and drive interest in the games.

who is Mason playing?

Fresno St.