NC State women’s basketball 2021-22 ACC schedule released

Hoops returns in less than two months.

On Wednesday night, the ACC released its 2021-22 women’s basketball conference schedule. (The men’s schedule comes Thursday night.) NC State will open conference play early on this year—Dec. 10, at Pittsburgh. The Wolfpack will play three ACC games before the new year as the league moves back to a regular 18-game slate.

The Pack’s full league schedule, via GoPack.com:

NC State gets the Tar Heels early in January and will have played Virginia twice by the middle of the month, which is a little odd. Virginia was one of two ACC teams (Duke the other) to opt out of the 2021 season.

The Wolfpack’s toughest competition in the regular season should once again be Louisville, and the two teams meet only once, in Raleigh on Jan. 20. Seems like it’d be good for the ACC to have its two best teams playing each other as much as possible, but what do I know.

That middle portion of the schedule, beginning with Duke or Louisville, is the toughest. Virginia Tech is solid, State has struggled recently in Chapel Hill, and both FSU and Georgia Tech should be good. Fortunately, there are a lot of home games in there.

NC State’s season gets underway on Nov. 9 against South Carolina.