Exploring the layout of the West Virginia basketball schedule

West Virginia now knows the times and broadcast networks for the 2024-25 men’s basketball schedule.

The Mountaineers will open with a preseason exhibition against Charleston and then play 31 regular season games that will conclude with the Big 12 Tournament.

The exhibition game and three of the four non-conference games will be televised on ESPN+ with the other being the 8 p.m. trip to Pittsburgh for the Backyard Brawl which will be carried by the ACC Network.

The Mountaineers will then head to the Bahamas for the Battle 4 Atlantis and each of those games beginning with Gonzaga will be televised on ESPN or ESPN2. The other two opponents will be Indiana or Louisville and then one of Arizona, Oklahoma, Providence or Davidson depending on the results.

The final game of the Big 12-Big East battle against Georgetown Dec. 6 is set for 7 p.m. and will be televised by ESPN 2 and then the final three games of the non-conference schedule will all be ESPN+ games with Dec. 10 against North Carolina Central (7 p.m.), Dec. 14 Bethune-Cookman (5 p.m.) and Dec. 22 versus Mercyhurst set for 2 p.m. All of that is pretty standard practice as in previous seasons.

However, the Big 12 schedule looks quite a bit different.

A total of 12 of the 20 games will be televised by ESPN+ with that list being: Dec. 31 at Kansas (TBA), Jan. 7 Arizona (7 p.m.), Jan. 12 Colorado (3 p.m.), Jan. 15 at Houston (8 p.m.), Jan. 18 Iowa State (5 p.m.), Jan. 29 Houston (7 p.m.), Feb. 2 at Cincinnati (2 p.m.), Feb. 5 at TCU (8 p.m.), Feb. 8 Utah (5 p.m.), Feb. 22 at Texas Tech (1 p.m.), March 4 at Utah (9 p.m.), March 8 UCF (5 p.m.).

Of those remaining eight conference games, a total of five of those will be on CBS Sports Network as part of the media rights deal announced a few weeks ago. Those games will be Jan. 4 Oklahoma State (12 p.m.), Jan. 21 Arizona State (9 p.m.), Jan. 25 at Kansas State (6 p.m.), Feb. 11 BYU (7 p.m.) and Feb. 25 TCU (9 p.m.).

That leaves just three games that will be televised on ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU in Feb. 15 Baylor on ESPN/ESPN2 (2 p.m.), Feb. 19 against Cincinnati on ESPN2 (7 p.m.) and March 1 at BYU on ESPN2/ESPNU (10 p.m.).

Of course, that number will increase by at least one depending on what unfolds in the Big 12 Conference Tournament because each of those games will be televised by one of the three networks.

Not including the exhibition and the conference tournament the breakdown goes as follows, 18 games on ESPN+ (including exhibition) 7 games on either ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU, 5 games on CBS Sports Network and 1 game on the ACC Network.

As for the times, only the road trip to Kansas has yet to be determined but the Mountaineers will only have four late tips with the Jan. 21 home game against Arizona State at 9 p.m. and Feb. 25 game against TCU at 9 p.m. Then the back-to-back road games March 1 at BYU at 10 p.m. and the March 4 trip to Utah at 9 p.m.

The league also provided four Saturday home games that start at or before 5 p.m.

So, like anything, there are ups and downs with the slate but considering the finish last season and the newness to it all with a new coaching staff the outcome isn’t necessarily surprising.