The Alabama men’s basketball team will travel to Madison Square Garden in New York City to compete in the championship rounds of the 2k Sports Classic. The Tide will be joined in the Big Apple by the three other host teams: Oregon State, Purdue and Villanova.
Alabama will face Oregon State on Thursday, Nov. 15, and the game will be televised on ESPN2 at 6 p.m.
“We’re excited to have the opportunity to go to New York and play in Madison Square Garden in a great tournament,” head coach Anthony Grant said. “We’re playing a very tough opponent in Oregon State. I’m really impressed with their team. We’re looking at a veteran team, a very well-coached team.”
With the game being played in the world-famous Madison Square Garden arena, there will be plenty of distractions for Grant and his players, but he has approached this matchup with the same mentality as any other game.
“This is game three for us,” Grant said. “The thing I talk to our guys about is every court we play on is 94-by-50, and the rim is going to be 10 feet from the ground. We’ve got to focus on the things that we need to do to give us a chance to win.”
The Tide did a poor job of rebounding in its last game against West Alabama. The Tigers out-rebounded Alabama 41-38, and Grant showed great displeasure in his team’s efforts on the glass.
However, the Tide’s relentlessness on defense has picked up where other aspects of its game have left off. Senior guard Andrew Steele attributed the team’s physical, defensive mindset as a key to its early-season success.
“The thing we try to work on is our defense,” Steele said. “I think that’s the biggest area we’ve improved on. Understanding how hard we’ve got to play. Understanding our defense is going to give us a chance to win every game.”
Alabama will need its defense to play well when it faces Oregon State’s Ahmad Starks. Starks, a junior guard, has averaged almost 26 points through the first two games of the season for the Beavers, scoring a career-high 33 points.
“He does things to help their team,” Grant said. “He’s a guy, another veteran guy for their team, that we’ve got to do a good job of being aware of where he is, trying to prevent his opportunities.”
The outcome of Thursday’s game will affect who, when and on what network the Tide will play on Friday, Nov. 16. If Alabama defeats Oregon State, it will play the winner of Purdue vs. Villanova at 6:30 p.m. on ESPN2 in the championship game. If the Tide loses to the Beavers, it will face the loser of the other game at 4 p.m. on ESPNU in the consolation game.
But Grant said he and his team are solely focused on the immediate future.
“Our focus will be strictly on Oregon State,” Grant said. “Some of our assistant coaches will start preparations in terms of watching the other teams and being prepared for whoever we would face in the second game.”
Some of the players on Alabama’s roster played in Madison Square Garden while competing in the NIT tournament two years ago, but for some, this will be their first experience in the storied arena.
