Headlined by showdowns against Connecticut, Kansas and a season-opening date with BYU, the Ohio State men's basketball program has unveiled its full nonconference schedule for the 2026-27 season.
With the NCAA moving to a 32-game regular-season maximum this season, Ohio State will play 12 nonconference games along with a 20-game Big Ten schedule, still to be fully announced. In May, the league shared how many times each team will play each other and where, but dates, times and broadcast information have yet to be publicized. The Buckeyes will play home-and-home games with Iowa, Penn State and Michigan.
Before they get to league play, though, the Buckeyes will go to Salt Lake City to take on BYU in a semi-neutral court game scheduled for Nov. 2.
That's the earliest start date in Ohio State history. Then OSU will return home to the Schottenstein Center on Nov. 6 when Youngstown State visits. Three days later, Ohio State will host Marshall before traveling to Storrs, Connecticut, to take on UConn as part of a home-and-home series that will conclude in 2027-28.
In addition to BYU and UConn, the Buckeyes will play three other high-major teams outside of the Big Ten. Ohio State will host Vanderbilt on Nov. 24, finish a home-and-home series by going to Notre Dame on Dec. 12 and face Kansas in the CBS Sports Classic in New York City on Dec. 19.
Eight of Ohio State's 12 nonconference games will be played at the Schottenstein Center, and just one of them is against a high-major team. On Nov. 24, the Buckeyes will host Vanderbilt, which went 27-9 last season and hired Ohio State associate head coach Joel Justus during the offseason. That midweek game will tip off four days before the football team hosts Michigan at Ohio Stadium.
Otherwise, the home slate features one team from Ohio (the aforementioned game against Youngstown State), one that made the NCAA Tournament last season (UMBC, which won the America East tournament) and a team that finished last in Division I last season at KenPom.com (Mississippi Valley State, which went 3-30 to rank No. 365 nationally).
The Mississippi Valley State game is an outlier among the buy games on Ohio State's home schedule, though. The other six teams being paid to play at Ohio State finished last season ranked no lower than No. 281 at KenPom, and the average ranking for the seven teams is 241. Excluding the worst-rated team in the nation last year, the other six have an average ranking of 220.
The schedule features a nearly two-week break between a Nov. 29 home game with Lipscomb and a Dec. 12 game at Notre Dame. The Buckeyes are likely to have at least one Big Ten game during that stretch and could also have one before the end of December.
Here is the full nonconference schedule.
Ohio State men's basketball nonconference schedule 2026
- Oct. 7 - vs. Cincinnati (exhibition, Mason, Ohio)
- Oct. 28 - Butler (exhibition )
- Nov. 2 - vs. BYU (Delta Center, Salt Lake City)
- Nov. 6 - Youngstown State
- Nov. 9 - Marshall
- Nov. 13 - at Connecticut
- Nov. 16 - Prairie View A&M
- Nov. 19 - UMBC
- Nov. 24 - Vanderbilt
- Nov. 29 - Lipscomb
- Dec. 12 - at Notre Dame
- Dec. 15 - Stony Brook
- Dec. 19 - vs. Kansas (CBS Sports Classic; Madison Square Garden, New York City)
- Dec. 22 - Mississippi Valley State
Ohio State men's basketball beat writer Adam Jardy can be reached at ajardy@dispatch.com, on Bluesky at @cdadamjardy.bsky.social or on Twitter at @AdamJardy.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: UConn, Kansas games highlight Ohio State men's hoops nonconference slate
