I know it's still football season, but these early season college hoops tournaments are rapidly becoming "Must See TV"
After all, where else in the early season are you going to get matchups like Syracuse-Florida, Texas-Iowa, Kansas-Arizona, and Arizona-UConn?
Traditionally, the best games are almost always in the Maui Invitational. The field is almost always stacked, and even though it's a single elimination tournament, everyone plays consolation games, so you are pretty much guaranteed 2 good opponents for your RPI, 3 if you don't have to face Chaminade (which doesn't count in your RPI either way).
And this year was no exception with 4 top-10 teams UConn, Michigan State, Gonzaga, and Arizona in the mix along with Maryland, Arkansas, and Kansas. That's a lot of combined national championships in one building.
The best game of a lot of great games had to be the Triple-OT thriller between Gonzaga, everyone's mid-major darling, and Michigan State. That was an incredible, hard-fought game. The only thing ugly about that game was Adam Morrison's mustache.
There were a lot of close games in the Guardians Classic as well. In the semis, Texas edged West Virginia, an Elite 8 team from last year, by one point, while Iowa shocked Kentucky 67-63. Iowa almost pulled off another shocker in the finals, but Texas pulled away late to win.
And, we still got a Preseason NIT final four that features Duke, UCLA, and Memphis to come.
If this doesn't get you pumped for college hoops, check your pulse.
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