Oregon basketball alum to play in The Basketball Tournament in Omaha
For the second time, former Oregon Ducks basketball players will participate in The Basketball Tournament, which will begin Saturday and run through Aug. 2 in various locations.
Oregon’s alumni team, Always Us, will be the No. 4 seed in the Omaha Regional and will face No. 5 seed Jackson Tennessee Underdawgs at 3 p.m. PT Saturday at D.J. Sokol Arena, airing on ESPN3. Should Always Us prevail, the team would face the winner of No. 1 seed Gutter Cat Gang and No. 8 seed The Cru (Valparaiso alumni) at 3 p.m. Sunday, July 17.
This will be is the second time Oregon alumni have participated in the tournament. Last year, Always Us won a game in the tournament before losing to Autism Army in the second round.
The team name Always Us came from a popular saying from Oregon head coach Dana Altman — “Sometimes you. Sometimes me. Always us." — that’s now become the unofficial slogan of UO basketball. The team will be coached by Oregon assistant coaches Mike Mennenga and Chris Reeves, with Brian O’Reilly and Robbie Ellis serving as the team's general managers.
The current roster includes former Ducks players Tajuan Porter, Jacob Young, Garrett Sim, EJ Singler, Johnathan Loyd, Jalil Abdul-Bassit, Casey Benson, Mike Moser, Shakur Juiston as well as Brian Conklin of Saint Louis and Michael Finke who played at Grand Canyon and Illinois.
The Basketball Tournament was founded in 2014 and is an open-application, single-elimination tournament played each summer. The 2022 edition features 64 teams, with four regionals of 16 teams each (similar in format to the NCAA Tournament), and each regional is held at a single host site.
The winning team will take home a $1 million prize. The entire tournament will be broadcast on the ESPN family of networks.
Boeheim’s Army (Syracuse Orange alum) is the defending champion as they're the No. 1 seed in the Syracuse Regional. The team is named after Syracuse legendary coach Jim Boeheim, who is a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame and National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.
Some of the other alumni teams participating in the tournament include Wichita State, Texas Tech, West Virginia, Buffalo, St. Bonaventure, East Tennessee State, James Madison, Marquette, Marshall, Purdue, Boise State and Auburn.
Contact Register-Guard sportswriter Antwan Staley at astaley@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @antwanstaley.
This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Oregon basketball alum to play in The Basketball Tournament in Omaha
