After a bit of a pause in scheduling news for FAU Men’s Basketball, Jon Rothstein reported on X that the Owls will be matching up with UCF in an away game in Orlando on November 12th. FAU is 10-22 all time against UCF, having last played on November 11th 2018, with the Owls coming out on top 80-79, a game in which the Owls came back from 20 down to win, ultimately getting a Simeon Lepichev tip in off a Michael Forrest missed jumper with less than a second remaining. This is the latest in a slew of battles of Florida on tap for the Owls this season, as FAU is in the second half of a home and home with both FIU & FGCU, taking on the Panthers in Miami and the Eagles in Boca Raton later this season. The Owls will be looking for revenge against FGCU who won the first half of the home & home last season in Ft.Myers 72-68, against FIU the Owls will be looking to sweep the series at FIU, having won last seasons matchup 90-64 at home. Also potentially on deck for the Owls is a delayed matchup against final four counterpart Miami, in the 2024 Shriners Children’s Hospital Charleston Classic. The Owls have been a confirmed participant in the Classic for over a month now and the full slate was officially announced on July 10th. The slate includes Drake, the University of Miami, Nevada, Oklahoma State, Seton Hall, Vanderbilt, and VCU, alongside FAU. With UCF added to the schedule, the Owls have the potential for 4 P5 non conference games depending on the matchups of the Charleston Classic and there is still more work to be done finalizing who the Owls play prior to the start of conference play. In 2023-2024 the Owls played 5 P5 non-conference games, 3 of which came in the ESPN Invitational, while in 2022-2023 the Owls only played 2. John Jakus spoke at length with reporters following his opening press conference, where he gave his thoughts on non conference scheduling, mentioning his understanding of the importance of scheduling and its influence on net ranking. “Our schedule is super important, that’s one of those things we’re going to address this week right away. What you do before Christmas is a big deal, obviously when you come off of a final four you want to schedule that way, the staff did a great job of that. I did scheduling for Mark Few at Gonzaga so I have a good handle on the landscape of that. I understand how the NET works, and I know you have to do certain things in order to make the tournament and it’s not just playing well but scheduling is a big deal. As far as the conference is concerned, you want a better conference, the better the conference is the more there is a chance it becomes a multi-bid league. So, we want to make the tournament, but frankly we want the American to have more than one team,” Jakus said. FAU still has some open dates on the non conference portion of the schedule, and to this point the Owls have not announced any buy games, so it’s likely the Owls have a couple buy games alongside a few more strong matchups to round out the non conference schedule. The Owls benefitted off a strong non conference schedule this past season and received an at large bid and had they not won C-USA in 2022-2023 they would have most likely been left out of the tournament, so with the Owls already having the potential for 4 P5 non conference games this season, FAU is putting themselves in the best position possible schedule wise.
