By: Colby Wilson, Associate Director of Athletics Communications
CLARKSVILLE—We have the greenlight for a schedule.
Thursday, the Ohio Valley Conference released the league schedule for the 2020-21 season, with a 20-game league slate scheduled to begin no later than December 30, pending no postponements due to COVID-19.
We use "no later than December 30," intentionally because the two mainstay marquee games on the Austin Peay schedule—the hosting of and visiting at Murray State—remain to be determined. With an emphasis on expanding schedules to give league opponents as many dates as possible, each pair of travel partner dates are being flex-scheduled to provide those opponents a more adaptable model to schedule around. At least one of those dates must be scheduled for before the Christmas holiday, with the other available as an in-season midweek, or both can be played before the league slate officially begins in earnest.
"Our athletics directors explored a number of scheduling options designed to address the scheduling challenges we may face due to the pandemic," said OVC Commissioner Beth DeBauche. "Ultimately, they decided to adopt schedules that increase the opportunity for conference competition while staying true to our traditional conference scheduling structure and pattern.
"Our intention is to play as close to a typical conference schedule as possible, but we stand ready to address scheduling challenges and modify the schedule during the course of the season should the facts warrant. I am grateful to our OVC leaders for their dedication, foresight and commitment to our student-athletes."
The original 18-game schedule for the OVC slate was retained, with one road date and one home date added for each team; this is reflected in the first scheduled week of the campaign, which sees Austin Peay travel to Tennessee State (Dec. 30) before hosting Eastern Kentucky (Jan. 2). Austin Peay has not kicked off the OVC schedule against Tennessee State since 1995.
Pending the home date against Murray State, the Govs will be traveling for much of the early part of the league calendar—they'll hit the road to take on SIUE (Jan. 7), Eastern Illinois (Jan. 9), UT Martin (Jan. 14) and Southeast Missouri (Jan. 16), meaning Austin Peay could start with as many as six of its first seven games on the road. The schedule begins to favor the Govs toward the month with four straight games in the Dunn Center against Tennessee Tech (Jan. 21), Jacksonville State (Jan. 23), Belmont (Jan. 28) and a return visit from Tennessee State (Jan. 30), a month to the day after the conference calendar began.
February finds the Govs back on the road for two at Eastern Kentucky (Feb. 4) and Morehead State (Feb. 6); the last time the Govs visited Morehead State, reigning OVC Player of the Year Terry Taylor poured in a career-high 43 points in a February 2019 meeting. The Govs then play four straight at home against UT Martin (Feb. 11), Southeast Missouri (Feb. 13), SIUE (Feb. 18) and Eastern Illinois (Feb. 20) before closing the schedule with dates at Tennessee Tech (Feb. 25) and Jacksonville State (Feb. 27); the Govs have not traveled to Cookeville in February since 2011.
All Thursday men's conference home games are scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m., with all Saturday OVC contests scheduled for a 4 p.m. tip-off.
For the fourth year in a row, the Ohio Valley Conference Basketball Championship will be held at the Ford Center in Evansville, Indiana, March 3-6. The NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament is scheduled to begin March 16, 2021 with the First Four in Dayton, Ohio.
Be sure to keep up with everything happening around Austin Peay at LetsGoPeay.com and the official Facebook page of Austin Peay athletics, as well on Twitter and Instagram (@letsgopeay). For all things related to men's basketball, be sure to follow @AustinPeayMBB on Twitter. Ticketing information will be forthcoming, with the Dunn Center slated for reduced capacity and enforced social distancing best practices to ensure everyone's safety during the 2020-21 season.
