South Dakota State Basketball: 2018-19 season preview for the Jackrabbits

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NEW YORK, NY – DECEMBER 16: Jeremiah Martin #3 of the Memphis Tigers looks on in the second half against the Louisville Cardinals during their Gotham Classic game at Madison Square Garden on December 16, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Abbie Parr/Getty Images) /

Non-conference schedule for 2018-2019

Nov. 6 (H) – Grand Canyon

Nov. 8 (H) – Alabama State

Nov. 10 (H) – Bemidji State

Nov. 16 (A) – Florida Gulf Coast

Nov. 19 (N) – Tulane

Nov. 20 (N) – UTSA or UC Irvine

Nov. 28 (H) – Kansas City

Dec. 1 (N) – Northern Iowa

Dec. 4 (A) – Memphis

Dec. 7 (H) – Southern

Dec. 11 (H) – Savannah State

Dec. 15 (A) – Nevada

Dec. 18 (A) – Eastern Washington

Dec. 22 (H) – Montana

The Jackrabbits have a great schedule in terms of the balancing tough games that will allow them to measure their strengths/weaknesses and winnable games that they can use to build momentum. The games that will present the biggest challenges are vs. Grand Canyon, @FGCU, vs. Tulane, @Memphis, @Nevada, and vs. Montana.

Beating Nevada, a preseason top 10 pick for most pundits, on the road would be a miracle, but the other five of those games are winnable. Fortunately for South Dakota St., most of their daunting games are in the second half of their schedule, so they’ll be used to playing high-level basketball by the time Summit League play rolls around.

The relative ease of the beginning of their schedule will allow coach Otzelberger to give different freshmen looks and mess around with his lineups to figure out what works. If he can discover two or three freshmen that are ready to take on bigger roles, that would give the team a much-needed boost come time to play teams like Memphis and Nevada.

Overall, expect the Jackrabbits to enter conference play with ~9/10 wins. There are eight games on their non-con slate (the eight not mentioned above) that they should be considered favorites in, and I think it’s reasonable, for now, to expect a 3-3 split in their 6 toughest ones. For Jackrabbit fans, be disappointed if they win 8 or less and be ecstatic if they top 10. The latter would mean this team is for real, and more than in just a Summit League sense of the phrase.