Fresno State University Athletics issued the following announcement on Nov 17.
The Mountain West announced its updated women's basketball on Tuesday morning. Fresno State will open league play on Dec. 28, hosting Colorado State at the Save Mart Center.
The new format emphasizes the health and safety of student-athletes, coaches and staff while significantly reducing travel. The conference has moved to a 20-game schedule under a modified format that will play out over 11 weeks within the context of state, county and local guidelines.
League play will begin with one two-game series taking place before Christmas for all 11 teams. After a short break, conference action will resume on Dec. 28 and conclude March 1.
In the new format, Mountain West teams will face each other in a two-game series in the same week with a one-day break between contests. Each institution will have five home and five road series, reducing the regular season travel schedule by four weeks to help mitigate potential virus exposures.
This is a one-year model adopted specifically to address the unique challenges of the current COVID-19 pandemic.
Conference play will determine the seeding for the 2021 MW Women's Basketball Championship, which will be held March 7-10 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas.
The Bulldogs enter this season as the league's defending regular-season champions, finishing with a program-best 16-2 MW record and return the conference's reigning Player of the Year (Maddi Utti), Freshman of the Year (Haley Cavinder) and Coach of the Year (Jaime White). Fresno State opened last season's conference slate with 15 consecutive wins to wrap up its first MW regular-season title with three games to play.
Along with Utti and Cavinder, the Bulldogs welcome back the bulk their production from a season ago and added three transfers and two freshmen to bolster their depth.
Fresno State's non-conference portion of the schedule will be released at a later date.
2020-21 Fresno State Mountain West Schedule
Dec. 28/30 - Colorado State
Jan. 2/4 - at Wyoming
Jan. 8/10 - at San Jose State
Jan. 14/16 - Nevada
Jan. 21/23 - Boise State
Jan. 28/30 - at New Mexico
Feb. 4/6 - at Utah State
Feb. 11/13 - Air Force
Feb. 18/20 - at San Diego State
Feb. 25/27 - UNLV
March 7-10 MW Championships (Las Vegas, Nev.)
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