The Sun Belt Conference will return to Thursday-Saturday basketball games this season, after experimenting with Saturday-Monday league play in recent years.
As in the past, teams will be paired up as "travel partners," with both men's and women's teams playing back-to-back road games against teams in similar geographic areas. The travel partner groupings are South Alabama-Troy, Coastal Carolina-Appalachian State, Arkansas State-Little Rock, Georgia Southern-Georgia State, Louisiana Monroe-Louisiana Lafayette and Texas State-UT Arlington.
Conference play begins Dec. 29, a Friday, due to the New Year's Day holiday. After a second conference game Dec. 31, league play goes to Thursday-Saturday the remainder of the year.