Virginia Basketball fans finally get their dream ACC/Big Ten Challenge game: Michigan State, coming to JPJ.
Of course, it’s the pandemic year, so, none of us can go.
Damn.
College basketball insider Jon Rothstein has the scoop on the matchups for the 2020 Challenge, which will take place Dec. 8-9.
Rothstein said ESPN will formally announce the matchups on Friday.
Based on the other games that he was able to confirm, it would look like UVA-Michigan State will be the main event.
Duke gets Illinois in Cameron, for instance, while North Carolina goes on the road to Iowa.
Actually, yeah, UNC-Iowa should be marquee.
And Louisville-Wisconsin ain’t bad.
Back to UVA-Michigan State: we’ve wanted that one since the back end of the 2014 and 2015 NCAA Tournament losses that prematurely ended promising seasons for the ‘Hoos.
It looked for a couple of hours that the return match might be the 2019 national title game in Minneapolis, after Virginia had dispatched Auburn in the first semifinal game, but then Michigan State choked in the second semifinal against Texas Tech.
The two teams have met twice in ACC/Big Ten Challenge games, most recently in 2002, when the Cavaliers lost 82-75 in Lansing.
The 2001 contest was held, for some odd reason, in Richmond, in a game that was halted in the second half due to poor floor conditions at the Richmond Coliseum, which, who would have ever guessed that something like that could happen at the Richmond Coliseum.
Story by Chris Graham
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