HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV) – Both James Madison men\u2019s and women\u2019s basketball teams now know their opening opponent in the first leg of the 2026-27 MAC-SBC Challenge.<\/p>\n
The Mid-American Conference and Sun Belt Conference announced Thursday that both Dukes teams will face Miami (OH) on Nov. 2, to open this season\u2019s challenge.<\/p>\n
The JMU men\u2019s team will host the RedHawks at the Atlantic Union Bank Center. It will mark the first meeting between the programs in Harrisonburg since the 2010-11 season, when the Dukes edged Miami 70-69. The teams last met in 2012, with Miami earning a 76-58 victory in Oxford, Ohio. The all-time series is tied 1-1.<\/p>\n
Miami enters the matchup after a historic 2025-26 season under head coach Travis Steele. The RedHawks finished the regular season 31-0 and earned an at-large berth in the NCAA Tournament, becoming the first Mid-American Conference team to receive an at-large bid since the 1998-99 season.<\/p>\n
On the women\u2019s side, JMU will face Miami (OH) for the first time in program history.<\/p>\n
Both programs went 2-0 in last season\u2019s MAC-SBC Challenge. The Dukes defeated Kent State and Massachusetts, while the RedHawks picked up wins over Coastal Carolina and Georgia Southern.<\/p>\n
JMU and Miami also both reached the NCAA Women\u2019s Basketball Tournament last season. The Dukes fell to Kentucky in the first round, while the RedHawks were eliminated by West Virginia.<\/p>\n
The MAC-SBC Challenge is a scheduling partnership between the Sun Belt and Mid-American conferences in men\u2019s and women\u2019s basketball. The event opens during the first week of the 2026-27 season, with Sun Belt women\u2019s teams traveling to MAC schools and MAC men\u2019s teams visiting Sun Belt programs.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 WHSV. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV) – Both James Madison men\u2019s and women\u2019s basketball teams now know their opening opponent in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[135456,135457,135458,135459,123,125,124,35342,42813,92016,92020,92025,92021,92017,92019,92024,92022,92018,92023],"class_list":["post-328083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-jmu-basketball","tag-jmu-mens-basketball","tag-jmu-womens-basketball","tag-mac-sun-belt-challenge","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news","tag-miami-ohio","tag-sun-belt-conference","tag-whsv","tag-whsv-3","tag-whsv-3-news","tag-whsv-news","tag-whsv-tv","tag-whsv-tv-3","tag-whsv-tv-3-news","tag-whsv-tv-news","tag-whsv-tv3","tag-whsv-tv3-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}