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Faculty basketball might need simply been gifted a Ultimate 4 preview — within the very metropolis the place the 2021 Ultimate 4 is scheduled to be held. It was introduced Thursday that the primary CBS faculty basketball broadcast for the 2020-21 season might be Gonzaga vs. Baylor — the 2 groups who’re ranked No. 1 and No. 2 respectively in CBS Sports activities’ preseason Prime 25 And 1.
They may play one another in a neutral-court sport at Indianapolis’ Bankers Life Fieldhouse at 1 p.m. ET on Dec. 5. The sport will function the lead-in to that day’s large “SEC on CBS” soccer matchup.
If each basketball groups stay as much as expectations for the 2021 NCAA Event, there’s an opportunity Bulldogs and Bears may face one another in the identical metropolis twice in the identical season. That will imply a rematch within the Ultimate 4.
The sport may have no followers in attendance as a result of COVID-19 precautions.
“The sport might be performed with no followers in attendance, a part of a managed surroundings in Indianapolis coordinated by Pacers Sports activities & Leisure and Indiana Sports activities Corp. Organizers will work with the Marion County Well being Division to implement acceptable COVID-19 protocols, as nicely, to assist shield the well being and security all of gamers, coaches and workers,” the discharge says.
CBS Sports activities was the primary to report in August that Mark Few and Scott Drew determined to make the progressive and strange midsummer choice to schedule one another for the upcoming season. It is uncommon to see two groups projected as top-five high quality not solely deliberately schedule one another, however to take action months into the offseason. Intersport is working the Dec. 5 occasion, however the firm has additionally teamed up with Indiana Sports activities Corp. and one other occasion organizer to try to placed on a bubble-like surroundings in Indianapolis for a number of groups later in December and in reality deep into the school basketball season.
The sport was made potential as a result of Gonzaga, on the time, shedding a number of Pac-12 opponents after the Pac-12’s presidents and chancellors made the preliminary choice to not enable faculty basketball to be performed earlier than Jan. 1. That call was reversed by the Pac-12 on Sept. 24, however Gonzaga has pressed on and aggressively appeared to schedule different high-profile opponents in latest weeks.
Gonzaga and Baylor have been a mixed 57-6 final season, and on March 12, when the NCAA Event was canceled, each groups have been projected as No. 1 seeds. The squads ought to have preseason All-American candidates: Baylor with Jared Butler and MaCio Teague; Gonzaga with Corey Kispert and Drew Timme. Gonzaga additionally brings aboard its highest-rated recruit in program historical past, Jalen Suggs, who was a top-10 prospect within the Class of 2020 in keeping with 247 Sports activities.
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