CU Buffs men's basketball will be part of challenging field at 2024 Maui Invitational
Apr. 4—A welcome and highly competitive late November sojourn into the tropics became official for the Colorado men's basketball team.
On Tuesday, the highly-regarded Maui Invitational announced its field for the 2024 tournament, and the Buffs will be joined in Hawaii by a who's-who of college basketball powerhouses that includes North Carolina, Michigan State, Auburn, Dayton, Iowa State, Memphis and newly-christened national champion UConn.
Next year's tournament will be the 41st edition of the Maui Invitational. It will be held Nov. 25-27, 2024, at the Lahaina Civic Center in Maui.
CU has played at the Maui Invitation once previously in 2009, losing to Gonzaga and Arizona (in overtime) before defeating Chaminade.
The 2024 field has combined for 45 Final Four appearances and 13 national championships, including the fifth in 25 seasons won by UConn on Monday against San Diego State. Memphis is the only program CU has never faced, and the Buffs' longest head-to-head drought against the other six teams is North Carolina. CU hasn't faced the Tar Heels since UNC eliminated the Chauncey Billups-led Buffs in the second round of the 1997 NCAA Tournament.
Teams will play three games in three days, with the bracket and first-round matchups to be announced at a later date.
"There is simply no other early-season college basketball tournament that rivals the spirit, talent and overall 'magic' of the Maui Jim Maui Invitational," tournament chairman Dave Odom said in a release. "The 2024 field is not only going to bring top tier programs representing eight of the most dominant conferences in the sport, but also fans from all corners of the country. Whether it's your first time on-island, or you've made packing into the historic Lahaina Civic Center an annual tradition, this tournament experience is on every college basketball fan's bucket list — and this loaded 2024 field is going to make it hard to resist."
As for the Buffs' 2023-24 schedule, no dates have been confirmed publicly yet outside of a return trip to Boulder by Grambling State as part of the Legacy Series between the Pac-12 and the SWAC. CU head coach Tad Boyle did say a few opponents have been locked into contracts, but the process of piecing together the following season's schedule has been pushed to later in the spring due to the roster uncertainty created by the transfer portal.
"We're working on it," Boyle said. "We've got some games locked in and we're currently looking to add some. But to be honest, I kind of put it on hold this time of year until we find out a little bit more about rosters being set. Because you can make a mistake pretty easily if you schedule a team that has four or five open scholarships right now, and they might get some really, really good players and they're a lot better than you thought they'd be. Or they might not get very good players and they're not as good as you thought they'd be. I'd like to have a little bit more certainty on the rosters of the teams we're going to play before we make those decisions."
