2018-19 Villanova Basketball schedule released

The Big East conference released the full 2018-19 basketball schedule today, meaning that we now know every Villanova Wildcats game on the regular season schedule for the upcoming season. We’re still waiting on game times, locations and television coverage for a majority of the games. Expect those details to come when Villanova formally releases the schedule, likely in the near future.

Editor’s Note: Villanova has since released the full schedule, which is updated below.

Without further ado:

For the first time in a couple of years, Villanova will be finished with the non-conference portion of the schedule before New Years. That includes the first time in school history that the entire Big 5 slate will be played in four consecutive games. But of course, the big news today is the Big East schedule.

For the third consecutive season the Wildcats will kick things off with DePaul. Then the Wildcats will quickly take to the road. Unlike last season, there is no real home-stand for the Cats. They don’t play at home more than twice in a row. The closest they come is the early part of February when they’ll play four of six games at home, and even those four will be split between the Pavilion and Wells Fargo.

Speaking of Nova’s downtown home stadium, the Wildcats will play four Big East games in South Philly this season: Xavier, Seton Hall, Georgetown, and Butler. The first three are clustered in late January and early February, while Butler will be the final home game of the season for the Cats on March 2nd.

As far as contenders for the crown go, Marquette seems to be the early favorites to challenge Villanova. We’ll have to wait and see how that pans out as the Wildcats and Golden Eagles won’t face off until mid and late February. Jay Wright’s pick to be his best competition was Butler, who the Wildcats will face on the road at the end of January, and then at home to kick off the month of March.

While there are no easy stretches in the Big East, there certainly are some tough ones. For Villanova, that will come in the second half of the conference schedule. First, the Wildcats will play a five game stretch that includes four road games at Marquette, St. John’s, Georgetown, and Xavier. That’s immediately followed by a home games with Marquette and Butler before closing out the season at Seton Hall. One thing’s for certain, the Wildcats will be well tested heading into the post-season this year.