Not only are Pitt and West Virginia playing football and basketball against one another again, but the Panthers and Mountaineers seem to be getting along just fine.

The Mountaineers announced their non-conference basketball schedule on Monday, and as expected, WVU is scheduled to visit the Petersen Events Center during the upcoming season. It's the third game in a four-game contract. WVU athletic director Shane Lyons and then-Pitt athletic director Scott Barnes signed the contract in September 2016 to revive a series that went dormant with conference realignment. They scheduled one December date in every year from 2017-20.

However, Monday's news revealed that the Mountaineers and Panthers are set to play at Pitt on Friday, Nov. 15.

The game was initially scheduled for Dec. 15. However, a Nov. 5, 2018 letter from Pitt athletic director Heather Lyke to Lyons stated the two schools were scheduled to play the game on Dec. 7 and then subsequently agreed to play the game on Nov. 15. That's hardly the most interesting part of that correspondence with Lyons, though.

At the end of her two-page note, Lyke scratched a kind message to Lyons off to the side of her closing signature: Best of luck down the stretch in football!

WVU's football team was two days removed from its thrilling victory at Texas that had many people talking about the team and its championship chances. The Mountaineers were 7-1 overall and 5-1 in the conference, and five days later, they'd thump TCU at home, 47-10, and move to No. 7 in the polls and No. 9 in the College Football Playoff rankings. They'd lose their final two games of the regular season on the road against Oklahoma State and then at home against Oklahoma before losing the Camping World Bowl against Syracuse.

247Sports obtained the document with a Freedom of Information Act request.

WVU basketball now has a game on Dec. 7 or 8 on the road against St. John's in the Big 12's debuting scheduling alliance with the Big East. The date will be determined later, and the Red Storm will pick the venue. The Mountaineers play host to Nichols State on Dec. 14, although that game was signed by the respective athletic directors in March. The 187th edition of basketball's Backyard Brawl is now the earliest the game has ever been played.

The series, of course, pressed pause after the 2011-12 season. The Panthers were headed to the ACC and the Mountaineers were bound for the Big 12. There was no movement toward playing the game for four full seasons due to a lack mutual dates on the schedule and/or the lack of a mutual interest in playing the game.

But in September 2015, eight months after Lyons was hired, he and Barnes agreed to play football again. A year later, they brought back the basketball series, which will be finished two years before the football series returns. The Mountaineers visit Pitt in 2022 and 2024 and are the hosts in 2023 and 2025.