Report: Texas to face Syracuse, Texas Tech faces St. Joe's in 2024 Legends Classic first round

According to Jon Rothstein of CBS Sports, Texas will face Syracuse while Texas Tech will play St. Joe’s in the first round of the 2024 Legends Classic. The event will take place in Brooklyn, NY at the Barclays Center. Games will take place on Nov. 21 and 22, a week before the Thanksgiving Holiday.

Two winners will advance to the championship game while the two losers will also face one another.

“Texas will play Syracuse and St. Joe’s will face Texas Tech in the first round of the 2024 Legends Classic at the Barclays Center, multiple sources told College Hoops Today,” Rothstein said. “An official announcement is expected soon.”

Just once have Texas and Syracuse faced one another, a game fans of the Orange likely remember quite well. The Final Four was held in New Orleans in 2003 and Carmelo Anthony led the school to its third-ever national championship, taking down the Longhorns on Saturday.

The two programs will look quite different come November, even if Jim Boeheim is not too far removed from his retirement. Adrian Autry is now the head coach while Rodney Terry runs things in Austin. A nice nonconference opportunity to both early in the calendar.

On the other side of the bracket, Texas Tech gets to play a mid-major foe in St. Joe’s. And there is a prior history between those two on the big stage.

Back during the 2004 NCAA Tournament, Texas Tech was an underdog to one-seeded St. Joe’s, facing off in the second round. The Hawks not only won that game but advanced all the way to the Elite Eight, losing to Oklahoma State by two points.

Returning to the future edition — Grant McCasland will be hoping to advance and get a high-major school on the schedule, with one probably meaning more than the other.

Texas-Texas Tech became quite an important matchup in the Big 12, occurring twice a season. But with the Longhorns now off to the SEC, nobody knew when the next showdown would take place. Nov. 22 is the potential answer although, it would take place quite far from the Lone Star State.

On3’s James Fletcher released his final preseason top 25 in early July, only having one of the four 2024 Legend Classic participants ranked. Texas comes in at No. 17, good enough for fifth in the SEC.

None of St. Joe’s, Syracuse, or Texas Tech are in Fletcher’s top 25.