AMHERST, N.Y. -- The Daemen University men's basketball team will play 28 games during the 2026-27 season, first-year head coach Ryan Grandits announced today. The reigning East Region champions will play 15 games in front of the vibrant home crowd at Lumsden Gymnasium this season, along with 13 road tilts. Of the 12 non-conference games the Wildcats will play this season, Daemen will face five teams from the Northeast 10 Conference, four teams from the Mountain East Conference and three Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) teams. 

The first chance to see the Wildcats will be in their exhibition game against St. John Fisher University at the KeyBank Center on Saturday, October 17 at 1:30 PM. Tickets are on sale now. 

The 2026-27 campaign officially begins in a rematch of the 2026 East Region Championship with a non-conference road game at Saint Anselm College on Monday, Nov. 9. The Wildcats make their home debut with a pair of games at the East Region Challenge on Nov. 13 and 14, beginning with Friday night's 7 PM match up with Saint Michael's College, a rematch of the 2026 East Region semifinals. Daemen will face the reigning National Champions Gannon Golden Knights on Saturday, Nov. 14 at 2 PM in their final game of the weekend.

The Wildcats will play three more non-conference games before opening up East Coast Conference play, heading down to West Virginia to play at Fairmont State University in a midweek match up on Wednesday, Nov. 18 before returning home for a pair of games against PSAC teams the following week of Thanksgiving, hosting Edinboro University on Monday, Nov. 23 at 7 PM and California University of Pennsylvania on Saturday, Nov. 28 at noon. 

The back-to-back defending ECC champion Wildcats opens up conference play with a road trip down to the city to play at Mercy on Thursday, Dec. 3 and Molloy on Saturday, Dec. 5. Daemen returns to Lumsden for two home games against Franklin Pierce University on Saturday, Dec. 12 and Salem University on Wednesday, Dec. 16 in their final home game of 2026. The Wildcats hit the road for the next five games, traveling to play at the University of Charleston on Sunday, Dec. 20. Daemen will then face a pair of NE10 teams in Assumption University (Wednesday, Dec. 30) and Adelphi University (Thursday, Dec. 31) before returning to ECC play and heading back down to the City to play at St. Thomas Aquinas College on Thursday, Jan. 7 and Queens College on Saturday, Jan. 9. 

Daemen will play nine of their last 13 games of the regular season at home. The Cats will host Molloy University (Thursday, Jan. 14) and St. Thomas Aquinas (Saturday, Jan. 16) then face Roberts Wesleyan University in a rematch of the 2026 ECC Championship on Thursday, Jan. 21. Daemen will play across town at D'Youville University on Thursday, Jan. 28 before returning to Lumsden on Saturday, Jan. 30 to host the College of Staten Island. The Wildcats travel eastbound on I-90 on Thursday, Feb. 4 to play at Roberts Wesleyan, and return home for the next five games, beginning with a Saturday, Feb. 6 tilt against Queens. The University of the District of Columbia comes to town on Thursday, Jan. 11, and the following Saturday (Feb. 13) the Wildcats will play East Stroudsburg University in their final non-conference game of the season. Daemen hosts D'Youville on Thursday, Feb. 18 and will play their final home game of the regular season against Mercy on Saturday, Feb. 20 for Senior Night. The Cats wrap up the regular season on the road at UDC (Thursday, Feb. 25) and Staten Island (Saturday, Feb. 27). 

The 2027 ECC Tournament semifinals and finals will be hosted by the regular season winner on March 6-7 with the first round matchups hosted by higher seeds on Wednesday, March 3. Daemen is the back-to-back reigning ECC regular season and tournament champions.

Hired as the seventh head coach in program history, Grandits made his return to Main Street in April after spending the 2025-26 season as the head coach of Point Park University in Pittsburgh, Pa. Grandits, the longtime top assistant under former head coach Mike MacDonald, inherited a program that has gone 61-3 over the last two seasons, won a pair of ECC titles, gone undefeated in conference play in back-to-back seasons and earned the East Region title for the first time since 2021.

The Wildcats return seven players from the 2025-26 campaign. Redshirt senior forward Phil Nwugwo (Rochester, N.Y.) highlights the returners after a breakout redshirt junior season where he finished sixth on the team in scoring, averaging 8.9 points and 4.8 rebounds per game along with shooting an impressive 61.9% from the field and totaling 38 blocks defensively. 2025-26 newcomers Nakyhi Harris (Buffalo, N.Y.) and Jaiden Harrison (Buffalo, N.Y.) also return to the team after playing solid minutes in their first season with the Wildcats. Grandits rounded out the roster by adding nine players, eight incoming freshmen and redshirt junior transfer Trevor Barrett (Cary, N.Y.) who comes to Daemen after spending his first two years at the University of Charleston in West Virginia.