Tonight sees the B1G-ACC Challenge begin earnest following two appetizer games last night. Coach Matt Painter and his #15 ranked Purdue Boilermakers travel to the (it pains me to even type a venue name THIS STUPID) KFC Yum! Center (seriously, who puts an exclamation point in the official name of their arena?) to take on the #14 Louisville Cardinals.
The Challenge, which began in 1999, was a fore-runner to a series of events implemented in recent years that attempt to stimulate more interest in pre-conference college basketball. As any veteran sportswriter with even a basic sense of honesty and candor will tell you, November and December college hoops just don’t move the needle most of the time.
There are a few exceptions, and in recent years most programs have joined forces with the television networks to remedy this by scheduling more games with higher quality match-ups. Most high major programs are playing other high majors on neutral courts in NBA arenas these days, plus you have holiday tournaments, which see higher quality match-ups and much better basketball.
The B1G/ACC Challenge is a made for television event created by ESPN. The Gavitt Tip-off Games is very similar, except it’s run by FOX/BTN and pairs the B1G against the Big East instead of the ACC. Purdue lost a very close and extremely entertaining contest against Villanova two weeks ago.
This game showed us just how great November college hoops can be, when it’s proverbially “on.” It’s really a shame that we’re not able to get more games of this quality in the non-conference part of the season
“It’s hard to schedule games of this nature,” said Purdue Coach Matt Painter stating that most top teams play in exempt contests and neutral site games.
“Everyone’s going to play in the B1G-ACC Challenge, the Crossroads Classic, things of that nature. Not everyone wants to play on the road, even if you do a home and home.”
“A lot of people play neutral site games, and that’s what you end up getting. You like to do it (schedule more games like the Villanova contest) to build up your resume. It’s not something you can’t do, it’s just harder to do.”
There you go- it’s not impossible, just difficult. Matt Painter has the right idea and the right attitude, and hopefully more programs will do a home and home and/or just get over their reluctance to play on the road.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous radio and television talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram and Sound Cloud.