Sports
ACC/SEC Basketball Challenge events take center stage – Southeastern Conference
Live Now: The Paul Finebaum Show
Live Now
The Paul Finebaum Show
The inaugural ACC/SEC Men’s and Women’s Basketball Challenge events – matching the ACC and SEC men’s and women’s college basketball teams against one another, will be featured across ESPN platforms this week.
The ACC/SEC Men’s Challenge presented by Continental Tire will take place over consecutive days Tuesday and Wednesday, Nov. 28-29, while the ACC/SEC Women’s Challenge presented by Dixie Ultra is slated for Wednesday and Thursday, Nov. 29-30. Overall, the 28 Challenge games will air across five networks – ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ACC Network and SEC Network.
The Men’s Challenge features a total of eight teams ranked in the Top-25: Duke (No. 7), Miami (No. 8), and North Carolina (No. 17) from the ACC, and Tennessee (No. 10), Kentucky (No. 12), Texas A&M (No. 14), Mississippi State (No. 21) and Alabama (No. 23) from the SEC.
Tuesday’s marquee ESPN matchups include 2023 Final Four participant Miami at Kentucky (7:30 p.m.), followed by Alabama – the overall top seed in the 2023 NCAA Tournament, hosting Clemson (9:30 p.m.). On Wednesday, Nov. 29, Tennessee travels to Chapel Hill to face the Tar Heels (7:15 p.m.), followed by Duke at Arkansas (9:15 p.m.). Lead men’s analyst Jay Bilas will be on the call both nights, alongside Dave O’Brien and reporter Kris Budden for Miami-Kentucky, then he will join Dan Shulman and Kris Budden for Duke-Arkansas.
The Women’s Challenge features three Final Four teams from last season, including defending National Champion LSU and semifinalists South Carolina and Virginia Tech. In all, a combined 11 teams from the Top-25 will participate, including South Carolina (No. 1), LSU (No. 7), Ole Miss (No. 19), Tennessee (No. 20) and Mississippi State (No. 21) from the SEC, and NC State (No. 5), Virginia Tech (No. 9), Florida State (No. 15), Notre Dame (No. 18), Louisville (No. 22) and North Carolina (No. 24) from the ACC.
Matchups of note include Notre Dame at Tennessee (5 p.m., ESPN2) on Wednesday and a premier ESPN doubleheader on Thursday featuring South Carolina at North Carolina (7 p.m.) and Virginia Tech traveling to Baton Rouge to face the champion Tigers (9 p.m.).
The duo of Beth Mowins and Debbie Antonelli will be on the call twice during the women’s Challenge: Vanderbilt at NC State (Wed.) and South Carolina at UNC (Thurs.). Dave O’Brien and Rebecca Lobo are set to call the matchup of Women’s Final Four teams – Hokies vs. Tigers – in the marquee Thursday primetime window (9 p.m.) on ESPN.