2025-26 SJU Basketball Schedule

COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. – The Saint John's University basketball team released its 2025-26 schedule on Wednesday, Oct. 1.

The Johnnies and the rest of the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) are in the second year of a four-year trial in which conference play features 16 games (instead of 20). SJU will only play Bethel, Saint Mary's, St. Olaf and St. Scholastica once (and the other six MIAC members twice).

The Johnnies' nine non-conference opponents combined for a 152-95 (.615) record in 2024-25 and three joined SJU in the NCAA Tournament.

SJU opens the 2025-26 season by visiting Wisconsin-Oshkosh Nov. 8 and returns home to host three non-conference opponents. A pair of programs from the American Rivers Conference (ARC), Central (Iowa) and Simpson (Iowa), come to Sexton Arena Nov. 14-15, and Whitworth (Wash.) makes the long-distance trip to Collegeville Nov. 22. Central won the ARC and advanced to the NCAA Tournament. Aside from Simpson's 5-20 record last season, SJU's other eight non-conference opponents accumulated a 147-75 (.662) mark.

The Johnnies travel to Wisconsin-La Crosse for a matinee game on Thanksgiving Eve (Nov. 26) and venture to San Antonio for a pre-Christmas tournament Dec. 20-21 at Trinity (Texas). SJU faces the host Tigers in the opener and wrap up the weekend against Hardin-Simmons (Texas) the following day. La Crosse reached the NCAA's Elite 8, while Hardin-Simmons won the American Southwest Conference and advanced to the NCAA's Sweet 16. Non-conference play ends for SJU with a Jan. 12 home game vs. Minnesota-Morris.

SJU faces Division I St. Thomas in an exhibition game Dec. 11 at the new Lee & Penny Anderson Arena in St. Paul. The contest will serve as an exhibition for the Johnnies, but a regular-season game for UST. The exhibition game will be the first between the two basketball programs since 2021, when the Tommies won both meetings during the COVID-impacted 2020-21 season. - Purchase Tickets

Prior to that shortened season, SJU had won six of the previous eight meetings in the series. UST left the MIAC following the 2020-21 academic year for Division I and finished second in the Summit League last season with a 12-4 record (24-10 overall).

The defending MIAC regular-season and playoff champions begin conference play with back-to-back home games against St. Olaf (Dec. 3) and Concordia (Dec. 6) before traveling to St. Peter to face last year's co-champion Gustavus Adolphus on Dec. 10. SJU starts 2026 on the road at Augsburg on Jan. 3 before hosting Macalester (Jan. 7) and Hamline (Jan. 10) the following week. Four of SJU's next five games are on the road: Jan. 17 at Carleton, Jan. 21 at Bethel, Jan. 28 at Concordia and Jan. 31 at St. Scholastica. The lone home game during that stretch is Jan. 24's contest against Saint Mary's. 

The Johnnies then host Gustavus (Feb. 4) and Carleton (Feb. 7) before back-to-back trips to St. Paul at Macalester (Feb. 11) and Hamline (Feb. 14). The MIAC and regular-season schedule ends with Alumni/Senior Day against Augsburg on Feb. 21. 

The MIAC playoffs begin with the quarterfinals on Tuesday, Feb. 24, followed by the MIAC semifinals on Thursday, Feb. 26. The MIAC championship game, as well as the conference's automatic berth to the NCAA Division III tournament, will be determined on Saturday, Feb. 28. The high seed hosts in all three rounds.

SJU (25-4, 15-1 MIAC) won its 12th MIAC regular-season championship (fourth in the last six seasons) and earned the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Tournament with a 74-59 win over Carleton for the program's fourth MIAC playoff championship in the last six tournaments (ninth overall). The national postseason appearance was the Johnnies' 22nd (13th at the Division III level) and fifth in the last seven seasons. SJU ended the season ranked No. 13 in the final D3hoops.com Top 25 poll. 

The 20-win season was the Johnnies' 16th overall and sixth in the past nine seasons. Three of SJU's four losses were decided by four points or less.

SJU ended the 2024-25 season in Division III's top 25 in 10 statistical categories: second in assist/turnover ratio (+1.74); third in fewest turnovers per game (8.9), free-throw percentage (.782) and shooting percentage (.496); sixth in both attendance per game (1,012) and scoring margin (+15.7 ppg.); ninth in three-point percentage (.384) and total attendance (12,139); 19th in scoring defense (63.8 ppg.); and 22nd in three-point defense (.290). Individually, guard Zach Longueville '25 was 12th in assist/turnover ratio (+2.91).

SJU led the MIAC in per-game attendance (1,012 avg.) for the third-straight season and finished sixth in NCAA Division III in 2024-25. The Johnnies tout a 480-153 (.758) all-time record at Sexton Arena (Warner Palaestra), including an 83-12 (.874) mark over the last eight seasons.