For the first time as an 18-school entity, the Big Ten unveiled its men’s and women’s basketball schedules. Each school’s opponents were announced in early May, and the conference revealed the dates of those matchups Thursday.
The league will maintain a 20-game schedule for men’s basketball. Every school plays 14 teams once and three teams twice. The league selected each teams’ three double-play opponents based on multiple factors, including rivalry status, geography and national prominence.
Each Eastern and Central time-zone school will take one trip to the West Coast where they will play two games over a four-day period. To ease travel, each of those 14 schools travel to either Oregon and Washington or USC and UCLA.
For the West Coast teams traveling east, three of the single-play trips include back-to-back games within close proximity. Washington and Oregon, for instance, bundle games to Ohio State-Penn State, Michigan-Michigan State and Iowa-Wisconsin. Both schools’ only one-game trip east takes place in Minnesota. USC and UCLA bundle trips to Maryland-Rutgers, Illinois-Indiana, Purdue-Northwestern while both take single trips to Nebraska.
None of the West Coast schools will play outside of the Pacific time zone in December.
In women’s basketball, there are 18 Big Ten games. Each team plays 16 of the other teams once and has a designated rivalry opponent to play twice. Those double-play series include Indiana–Purdue, Michigan-Michigan State, Wisconsin–Minnesota, Iowa-Nebraska, Illinois-Northwestern, Oregon–Washington, USC-UCLA, Penn State-Rutgers and Maryland–Ohio State.
The West Coast schools will bundle all six games into three trips to the Eastern and Central time zones. Like the men, all Eastern and Central time-zone women’s teams will travel west just once with two games over a four-day period.
For both the men and women, the single-play locations flip for the 2025-26 season. The double-play opponents will remain in place through that season as well.
Both Big Ten tournaments take place in Indianapolis, and the top 15 teams qualify. The men’s tournament is slated for March 12-16, while the women’s tournament is scheduled for March 5-9.
Previewing the men’s basketball schedule
Purdue has a great opportunity to build some momentum on its way to trying to win a third straight conference title. The Boilermakers do not play a team in my preseason Top 25 until Game 10 against Michigan. The schedule is backloaded and Purdue does play challengers Indiana and Michigan twice, but fast starts have been key to the last two title runs, as Purdue has opened 12-2 in conference both years.
Michigan State and Indiana also have backloaded schedules and easier stretches to start. Both teams do not see one of my preseason Top 25 teams until Game 7. This could be beneficial for the Hoosiers, specifically. This is a huge year for Mike Woodson, and it could take some time to work in his star-studded transfer class.
Looking over these schedules is a reminder of how strange it is that four West Coast schools are now in this league. It makes no sense (hooray conference realignment), but the schedule makers have at least come up with logical solutions, making it so each of the four schools only takes four trips east and each play their former Pac-12 members twice. You could have some old Big Ten coaches crying foul if there’s ever a season where one former Pac-12 school is head and shoulders better the other three, which could create schedule imbalance and an advantage for that team in the conference race. It’s hard to say if that’ll happen this year because there’s so much roster turnover throughout the league. — C.J. Moore, college basketball staff writer
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Previewing the women’s matchups
The nation’s two leading returning scorers are scheduled to face off on Feb. 2 — the Sunday before the Super Bowl. USC’s Juju Watkins (27.1 points per game) and Iowa’s Lucy Olsen, who averaged 23.3 points per game at Villanova last year, meet at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in what promises to be one of the nation’s top regular-season matchups. Iowa sold out every home game last year, the first team in Big Ten history to do so.
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Both Iowa and USC were No. 1 seeds in the NCAA tournament. The Hawkeyes, which lost Clark and Kate Martin to the WNBA but bring back Hannah Stuelke, advanced to the NCAA championship game, while the Trojans reached the Elite Eight.
UCLA and Ohio State were No. 2 NCAA tournament seeds and return two of the nation’s top players in Kiki Rice (Bruins) and Cote McMahon (Buckeyes). Indiana, which was a No. 4 seed, features returning senior Sydney Parrish. The Hoosiers reached the Sweet 16, where they fell to eventual national champion South Carolina 79-75. Nebraska, which reached the Big Ten championship game, brings back center Alexis Murkowski. Perennial power Maryland fell to a No. 10 seed last year after an Elite Eight appearance in 2023 and expects to rebound.
Among the highest-profile women’s basketball games include UCLA at Indiana, Jan. 4; Indiana at Iowa, Jan. 12; USC at Indiana, Jan. 19; Ohio State at UCLA, Feb. 5; Ohio State at USC, Feb. 8; UCLA at USC, Feb. 13; Iowa at Ohio State, Feb. 17; Ohio State at Indiana, Feb. 20; UCLA at Iowa, Feb. 23; USC at UCLA, March 1. — Dochterman, Iowa staff writer
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(Photo: Mitchell Layton / Getty Images)
