A couple of games into BYU’s Big 12 basketball slate last January, first-year head coach Kevin Young and his staff realized what they had feared would happen when they inherited their nonconference schedule was actually happening.
The 2024-25 Cougars were simply not ready for the physicality and athleticism they were facing in early conference games against Arizona State, Houston, Texas Tech and TCU. They went 1-3 in those games, defeating only ASU, at home.
“Last year’s (nonconference schedule) was fine, but you can only get so much out of some of those games,” Young told the Deseret News Thursday. “You need better (competition). I think it kind of goes in line with our whole philosophy of just trying to get to the getting to a lot sooner.”“I am learning how scheduling in college basketball actually works. There are these people — brokers, essentially — that try to put games on and so forth. I wasn’t aware of that. That became more active. Once we showed (BYU was willing to play) it definitely wasn’t that hard to put things together.”
— BYU coach Kevin Young
Wednesday, it was announced that BYU will face Clemson in the 2025 Jimmy V Classic on Dec. 9 at 4:30 p.m. MT at Madison Square Garden in New York City
See below for venues and dates; exact tipoff times and television broadcast plans have not been announced, in most cases.
That’s six Power Four foes, which Young said was the goal when they started the scheduling process shortly after signing No. 1 prep recruit AJ Dybantsa last November.
Additionally, BYU will face Nebraska in Lincoln and North Carolina in Salt Lake City (Delta Center) in exhibition games in October. A new NCAA rule allows teams to play two televised exhibition games that can be televised and in which fans can attend, but the results aren’t reflected on a team’s record.That philosophy that a major upgrade to their nonconference was vital to their Big 12 success, and to getting a higher seed in the NCAA Tournament, has been apparent as Young and his staff have added one big-time opponent after another to their pre-January schedule for the 2025-26 season.
