NCAA Snubs Stanford and Cal in ACC-SEC Challenge — Fair or Flawed?

Stanford and Cal men's basketball are becoming completely disrespected by the NCAA. Recently, college basketball announced an ACC-SEC challenge. During the non-conference slate of the season, ACC and SEC teams will compete against each other to prove who truly the best conference in college basketball.

A few of the headliners are Florida at Duke, North Carolina at Kentucky, Clemson at Alabama, and Louisville at Arkansas, but many some other games are intriguing as well among the rest of the schedule.

Virginia plays at Texas, NC State plays at Auburn, Oklahoma plays at Wake Forest, SMU plays at Vanderbilt, Texas A&M plays at Pitt, Mississippi State plays at Georgia Tech, Miami plays at Ole Miss, LSU plays at Boston College, Virginia Tech plays at South Carolina, Tennessee plays at Syracuse, Missouri plays at Notre Dame, and Georgia plays at Florida State.

Of course every team from these conferences should be featured, right? Well that's not the case this year. Stanford and Cal are notably absent from this list of matchups. Most will argue that the reasoning behind it is due to the fact that the SEC has 16 teams while the ACC has 18, which is fair. They're also the two newest programs in the ACC.

Last season, Cal had another poor season under head coach Mark Madsen, finishing 14-19 overall and 6-14 in conference play. They ended the season ranked 15th in the ACC, and fell in the second round of the ACC tournament to rival Stanford.

The Cardinal, had a 21-14 season in their first year under Kyle Smith, which included an 11-9 record in conference play. They showed that they belong in the ACC last season. All year, Stanford defied the odds and expectations, finishing seventh in the conference standings, and making the third round of the ACC Tournament, falling to Louisville due to a Chucky Hepburn buzzer beater.

Due to the fact that only 16 teams can compete in the ACC-SEC challenge, the top 16 teams should compete in the challenge. In that case, Miami and Boston College should be eliminated, while Stanford, who finished seventh, and Cal, who finished 15th would be included in the ACC-SEC matchups.

Stanford and Cal both had respectable seasons, and deserve to compete in this challenge. If the NCAA wants to showcase the best teams in each conference, the competitors should be based on ability not location or when they arrived, right?

One potential reason, other than Stanford and Cal being the newest programs in the ACC and the number of programs in each conference not aligning, could be that both schools are located in California, and would require more miles logged to an already grueling conference schedule. If they have to travel to the east coast for non-conference games, too, that could present an issue.

Last season, Stanford didn't leave the state until January 1 to face Clemson.

Stanford and Cal will now have to find other non-conference games to compete in next season. However, if the NCAA truly understands what these programs have to offer, without a doubt these Bay Area schools should be competing in the ACC-SEC challenge next season.

The ACC-SEC challenge will be played on Tuesday, December 2, and Wednesday, December 3.