Putting together the non-conference schedule for the upcoming season was about as challenging as it has been in quite some time.

Shockingly teams were not lining up to face a team returning not only the national player of the year (Breanna Stewart) but also a player who could end up going No. 1 overall in the 2015 WNBA Draft (Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis), one of the nation's best point guard (Moriah Jefferson) in addition to some talented role players (Kiah Stokes, Morgan Tuck and Saniya Chong) and one of the top recruiting classes coming in.

The good news is that while UConn had to struggle a bit to put all the pieces in place, the Huskies are already ahead of the game in piecing together next season's non-conference schedule.

UConn will host Stanford and Notre Dame and will play South Carolina, DePaul (in Morgan Tuck's homecoming game) and UCLA on the road. There was a report that UConn will play at Tennessee Chattanooga while talks continue between UConn and Louisville. Assuming that the Huskies play another three-game tournament, that would only leave two spots to fill. It remains to see if anything can be worked out between UConn and Duke because as of right now the series will end after this season. Also, word is UConn is attempting to secure a homecoming game for Breanna Stewart. However, getting teams to agree to host UConn after a program-changing player opts to leave to play for the Huskies is not as easy as it may sound. It doesn't sound as if Syracuse is a likely option so if I worked at schools like Colgate or Cornell I would have the number of UConn senior women's administrator Deb Corum on speed dial. Colgate, only about 30 miles from Syracuse, averaged 456 fans in 12 home dates a season ago while Cornell drew an average of 446 fans in 14 home games. Although Cornell is about twice as far away from Syracuse, the Big Red's home arena holds almost 4,500 while Colgate's home capacity is listed at 1,760 on the university's official site. The only other Division I school within 100 miles of Syracuse is Binghamton, which is about 80 miles away and has shown the ability to draw more fans than the other two programs with an average home crowd of 1,859 a season ago . It is just me thinking out loud, but if one of those schools balks at being on the wrong side of a lopsided UConn win perhaps school officials might consider playing one of its two preseason exhibitions at Division II Le Moyne within the Syracuse city limits. I'm sure if it is at all possible, UConn will have some sort of homecoming game for Stewart. Stay tuned.