CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. – Southeast Missouri women's basketball has finalized the 2024-25 schedule, the program announced on Tuesday morning.
The Redhawks will begin the Briley Palmer era with 11 non-conference matchups, including 10 matchups against Division I opponents, beginning in Dayton, Ohio against Atlantic-10 opponent, Dayton, on Tuesday, November 5.
The season-opener marks the first-of-four-straight road games to begin the season. The Redhawks will matchup with Southeastern Conference foe, Texas (Nov. 10) followed by Evansville (Nov. 14), and former Ohio Valley Conference opponent, Eastern Kentucky (Nov. 17).
Texas, who finished 33-5 a season ago, won the Big 12 Conference tournament in their final year of their affiliation with the conference before advancing to the Elite Eight in the NCAA Women's Tournament concluding their season with a loss to NC State.
SEMO will play their first game in the Show-Me Center on Monday, Nov. 25, against rival Southern Illinois at 6:30 p.m. followed by a Saturday matchup with Indiana State (Nov. 30) marking back-to-back matchups with Missouri Valley Conference teams.
A trip to Arkansas on Sunday, Dec. 8, will be the final road matchup before four-straight home games. SEMO will host Missouri State (Dec. 16) before beginning conference play. SEMO opens its 20-game OVC schedule at home prior to Christmas against Eastern Illinois (Dec. 19) and SIU Edwardsville (Dec. 21).
The final non-conference matchup will take place on New Year's Eve (Dec. 31) against NAIA-member, William Woods at the Show-Me Center.
For the second-straight year the league membership includes 11 teams (Eastern Illinois, Lindenwood, Little Rock, Morehead State, SEMO, SIU Edwardsville, Southern Indiana, Tennessee State, Tennessee Tech, UT Martin and Western Illinois).
In 2024-25, the Conference schedule switches to a true round-robin slate of 20 games (after being 18 games a season ago). The OVC has also had a 20-game league schedule from 2005-06 through 2007-08 and in 2020-21.
With the increased number of games, the schedule begins before the Christmas holiday, with 11 games between December 17 and December 21. The regular season will conclude on Saturday, March 1.
The 2025 OVC Men's and Women's Basketball Tournament is slated for March 5-8 at the Ford Center in Evansville, Indiana. It marks the eighth year in a row the event will be held at the venue.
Each OVC school is eligible to compete and win the OVC Tournament Championship, including Lindenwood and Southern Indiana, which are in year three of the reclassification process to Division I. Should a transitioning school win an OVC Tournament Championship, the AQ shall be awarded to the tournament runner-up. Should the runner-up not be eligible, the AQ representative shall be the semifinalist that had the highest remaining seed going into the tournament.
All Conference games and home non-conference contests can be seen on ESPN networks, with the majority of games broadcast on ESPN+. Additional linear exposures on ESPNU and ESPN2 will be announced at a later date.
