The Massachusetts basketball team will play Mississippi in the annual Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Holiday Showcase game next season on Dec. 5, as announced by UMass Athletics Wednesday afternoon.

The game will mark the eighth straight year the Minutemen will play at least one game at the MassMutual Center in Springfield, where the event is hosted.

In last season’s Holiday Showcase matchup with Florida Gulf Coast, UMass lost 84-75 to end its six-game winning streak in the building. The prior year, the Minutemen outlasted Brigham Young in a high-scoring 105-96 victory in Springfield.

The Minutemen will face the Rebels for the first time in program history. Ole Miss comes off a 21-13 season in 2014-15 in which it earned a No. 11 seed in the NCAA tournament. After defeating BYU in the tournament’s first round, the Rebels were eliminated by No. 6 seed Xavier in the round of 64.

Three starters return to Ole Miss in 2015-16, including senior Stefan Moody, who earned All-Southeastern Conference honors and led Ole Miss in points in both tournament games last year – the guard scored 26 and 14 points respectively against the Cougars and Musketeers.

“Ole Miss is a strong program that competes on a national level and has been to the NCAA Tournament twice in the last three years,” UMass coach Derek Kellogg said in a press release by the Basketball Hall of Fame. “We are looking forward to having a high RPI team of their caliber on the schedule next season.”

The Minutemen will return two starters next year after finishing 17-15 and missing out on the NCAA and NIT tournaments in 2014-15. They were bounced out of the Atlantic 10 tournament in the first round after a 76-69 loss to La Salle at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Anthony Chiusano can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @a_chiusano24.