Calipari doesn't want SEC to add more conference games

Tom Izzo said Monday he would be in favor of the Big Ten moving to a 20-game conference schedule if the other Power 5 conferences followed suit. John Calipari, for one, hopes they don't.

The Kentucky head coach isn't in favor of adding a pair of extra SEC games.

"I wouldn't be for it," Calipari said in a conference call Tuesday, according to Joe Mussatto of SEC Country. "Obviously, I'm not going to get a vote on it. I just think what all of us do outside our league is very important. There have been teams in those leagues that you talk about, 'Let's do a home and home,' and they all say the same thing: 'If we have 20 (league) games, I'm not going to do that.' So what you do is you take away some of those kind of games that have been good to us."

Calipari likes the control that a school gets by scheduling those two games itself.

"If you need a tougher game, if you have a rivalry game, if you need an easier game, if your team needs a team they can beat or a team they're challenged by or you need a road game, you can do it with those two games," Calipari said. "Hopefully for this league, we'll stay where we are. But if we don't, we'll make it work."

Izzo's concern centers on Selection Sunday and comparing records when the committee chooses teams for the NCAA tournament. Teams often pad their stats early in the season with easier non-conference games, so it could create a disparity if only some Power 5 conferences move to 20 games.

Kentucky typically plays some premier non-conference games, though, with matchups against Michigan State, North Carolina, UCLA, and Louisville last year.

The ACC has penciled in the 2019-20 season for its move to 20 conference games.