William & Mary basketball faces a challenging schedule for 2019-2020 that features four NCAA Tournament teams from last season.
The Tribe’s 12 Division I opponents combined to average nearly 19 wins last season with a winning percentage of 57.2. In total, six W&M opponents participated in the postseason in 2019, including four conference champions.
The slate is road-heavy with just four home games compared to nine on the road or at a neutral site. The four home games are the fewest for the Green and Gold since the 2012-13 season. Highlighting the Tribe’s home ledger are in-state tilts with Hampton (Nov. 15) and Old Dominion (Dec. 3). W&M and the Pirates meet for the 22nd time in the last 25 years and the fifth-straight year overall. The Tribe and Monarchs meet for the 47th year in a row, and W&M has won six of the last eight meetings.
Despite fewer contests in Williamsburg, fans in Northern Virginia and the Washington, D.C. area will have two chances to catch the Tribe in action during new coach Dane Fischer’s first season. W&M travels to American on Friday, Nov. 8, to face its former Colonial Athletic Association foe. The Green and Gold plays a neutral site game at Entertainment & Sports Arena in Washington, D.C., the same site as the CAA Tournament, just before Christmas. The Tribe faces regular season Northeast Conference Champion Saint Francis (Pa.) on Sunday, Dec. 22.
As previously announced, the Tribe will take part in a multi-team exempt (MTE) event for the second year in a row, competing in the 2019 Hall of Fame Classic Powered by ShotTracker in November. W&M travels to Wofford (Nov. 12), Oklahoma (Nov. 18) and Stanford (Nov. 21), while hosting Morehead State (Nov. 26). Both Oklahoma and Wofford competed in the NCAA Tournament a season ago, and the three road games are among five of the first six away from Williamsburg.
The Tribe opens the season with a three-game road swing, beginning with High Point on Tuesday, Nov. 5. W&M and HPU play for the seventh time in the last eight years, and while the Panthers leads the series, 5-4, the Tribe claimed a 79-69 win in Williamsburg last season. W&M’s trips to American (Nov. 8) and Wofford (Nov. 12) complete the opening road swing before the first game in Kaplan Arena against Hampton (Nov. 15).
W&M’s road slate also includes trips to reigning Mid-American Conference Champion Buffalo, Fairfield and Saint Joseph’s. The game with the Bulls closes out the first month of the season on Nov. 30. Buffalo finished last season at 32-4 with a national ranking in the top 20. The Tribe heads to Fairfield on Dec. 8 for its final game before final exams. After a home game against Goucher (Dec. 15) during finals a week later, the Green and Gold heads to Philadelphia on Thursday, Dec. 19, to meet Saint Joseph’s for the second-straight year. The Tribe rallied from a 20-point deficit to knock off the A-10 school in Williamsburg last season on a Nathan Knight hook shot with 1.7 seconds remaining.
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