The 2020–21 Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team represented
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private university, private Jesuit research university in Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic higher education, Ca ...
in the
2020–21 NCAA Division I men's basketball season
The 2020–21 NCAA Division I men's basketball season began on November 25, 2020, and concluded on March 14, 2021. The 2021 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament culminated the season and began on March 18 and concluded on April 5.
Season ...
. The Hoyas, led by fourth-year head coach
Patrick Ewing
Patrick Aloysius Ewing Sr. (born August 5, 1962) is a Jamaican-American basketball coach and former professional player who is a basketball ambassador for the New York Knicks of the National Basketball Association (NBA), where he played most o ...
, were members of the
Big East Conference
The Big East Conference (stylized as BIG EAST) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference that competes in National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA NCAA Division I, Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. H ...
. Although the Hoyas normally play their home games at the
Capital One Arena in
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...
, public-health restrictions due to the ongoing
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
forced Georgetown to play its home games on campus at
McDonough Gymnasium without fans.
[.]
UConn (Connecticut) joined the Big East Conference this season. Like Georgetown a founding member of the
original Big East Conference of 1979–2013, UConn had remained behind in the old conference — which renamed itself the
American Athletic Conference
The American Athletic Conference (AAC), also known as The American, is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States, featuring 13 full member universities and 6 affiliate member universities that compete in t ...
, marketed as "The American" — when
Georgetown and six other schools left it to form the new Big East Conference in 2013. Georgetown and UConn had played only twice since then, in non-conference games in
2016
2016 was designated as:
* International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly.
* International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...
and
2017
2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly.
Events January
* January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...
, but UConn's move to the Big East allowed the conference
rivalry
A rivalry is the state of two people or groups engaging in a lasting competitive relationship. Rivalry is the "against each other" spirit between two competing sides. The relationship itself may also be called "a rivalry", and each participant ...
between the schools to resume in 2020–2021.
UConn's move to the Big East also expanded the Big East regular season. Beginning in 2020–2021, each Big East team was scheduled to play 20 regular-season conference games rather than the 18 they had played each year from the
2013–2014 through
2019–2020 seasons. However, the cancellation of some games during 2020-2021 due to COVID-19 issues resulted in only two teams playing their full slate of 20 games. The Hoyas played only 16 conference games during the 2020–2021 season.
Despite having nine new players and a preseason consensus that they would finish at the bottom of the Big East, the Hoyas had an unexpectedly successful season. They finished in eighth place in the Big East during the regular season, then won the
2021 Big East men's basketball tournament — their first Big East championship since
2007
2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year.
Events
January
* January 1
**Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...
— to earn an automatic bid to the
2021 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament
The 2021 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament was a single-elimination tournament of 68 teams to determine the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I men's college basketball national champion for the 2020–21 seaso ...
, their first appearance in the tournament since
2015
2015 was designated by the United Nations as:
* International Year of Light
* International Year of Soil __TOC__
Events
January
* January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...
. They lost in the first round to
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...
.
Previous season
The
Hoyas finished the
2019–20 season at 15–17, 5–13 in
Big East play, and tied for eighth place in the conference. As the No. 8 seed in the
Big East tournament, they lost in the first round to
St. John's. The following day, the remainder of the Big East tournament and all other NCAA postseason play was canceled because of the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
. Georgetown finished the season with an overall losing record for the third time in five years and with a 5–13 conference record for the third time in four years.
Offseason
Departures
Incoming transfers
2020 recruiting class
Roster
Notes: (1) On December 18, Georgetown announced that Jalen Harris was taking a leave of absence from the team for "family reasons;" he did not return. (2) Chuma Azinge was a "recruited walk-on."
Schedule and results
, -
!colspan=9 style=, Regular season
, -
!colspan=9 style=",
Big East tournament
, -
!colspan=9 style=",
NCAA tournament
Awards and honors
Big East Conference honors
Notes
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:2020-21 Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team
Georgetown Hoyas
Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball seasons
Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team
Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team
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