Courtesy graphic
After a relatively rough season last year, things are looking up for Mike Anderson and the Razorback Basketball team. Way up.
The Hogs finished with a disappointing 16-16 record in 2015/16, but the Hogs have had a great year on the recruiting trail this year securing several highly-regarded for the upcoming 2017, 2018, and 2019 classes. On Wednesday, it was announced that Arkansas has been added to the field of likely the most prestigious pre-season tournament in the country for 2017.
Arkansas will play in next year’s Phil Knight Invitational, a 16-team tournament set for Thanksgiving weekend, Nov. 23-26 in Portland Oregon honoring the Nike Founder on his 80th birthday.
The field features some heavy-hitting basketball programs, including Connecticut, Duke, North Carolina, Florida, Georgetown, Butler, Gonzaga, Michigan State, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Oregon, Portland, Portland State, Stanford and Texas.
A hype video for the tournament released this week is calling the field “the best collection of college basketball teams in the history of sports.”
Bold statement, but kind of hard to argue with. The participating schools have combined for 23 National Championships, 85 Final Fours, more than 380 NCAA Championship appearances and more than 680 NCAA Championship wins. Ten of the 16 schools have won a National Championship.
The event will feature two eight-team brackets running simultaneously in the two buildings, and will crown a champion in each of the two brackets. All sixteen participating teams will play three games during the tournament, and all of the games will be televised by ESPN.
