2016 The Basketball Tournament: Super 16 Day 1 Schedule & Open Thread

Hey, I’ll admit that we didn’t do an Open Thread for the first two days of The Basketball Tournament.

1. Golden Eagles Alumni wasn’t playing.
2. Each half of every game got it’s own Facebook stream and that’s hard enough to keep track of when you’re not emotionally invested in the outcome.
3. That was BEFORE Golden Eagles Alumni advanced to the Super 16 and thus turned these eight teams playing today into potential opponents in the championship game.

But now we’re here, and now the games are on ESPN2 and ESPN3. It’s so much easier to watch when you just have to flip open your WatchESPN app or turn on the television.

Here’s the schedule for today’s games, along with the notable names playing for each team.

All times Central, by the way.

1pm: South Semifinal - #5 TMD vs #8 Trained To Go (ESPN3/WatchESPN)

TMD: General Manager/Shooting Guard Marshall Henderson and Mike Bruesewitz are the names that jump off the page. Aaron Jones, Stanton Kidd, Malcolm Miller, Marshawn Powell, Christopher Warren, and Bob Young all played Division 1 basketball.

Trained To Go: Earl Calloway, Mickell Gladness, Amadi McKenzie, Brenton Petway, Andres Sandoval, Asauhn Tatum, and Damien Wilkins list Division 1 experience.

3pm: Northeast Semifinal - #1 City Of Gods vs #5 FOE (ESPN3/WatchESPN)

City Of Gods: This team is loaded with familiar names like DerMarr Johnson and James White (Cincinnati), Chris Wright and Michael Sweetney (Georgetown), and Pops Mensah-Bonsu (George Washington). Everybody else on the roster lists Division 1 experience, too.

FOE: The Morris twins who played at Kansas are the Coach and GM of this squad, which includes Temple’s Dionte Christmas, “Mr. BYU Honor Code” Brandon Davies, former Marquette signee Tyshawn Taylor, and Villanova’s Maalik Wayns amongst others.

6pm: Northeast Semifinal - #2 Boeheim’s Army vs #3 Untouchables (ESPN2/WatchESPN)

Boeheim’s Army: The team of Syracuse alumni is unsurprisingly loaded with guys you know: Eric Devendorf, C.J. Fair, Rick Jackson, Baye Moussa Keita, Donte Greene, Brandon Triche, and Hakim Warrick. They’ve also activated their right to add a ringer because they got 2,000 votes, but their ringer is still a mystery as of Thursday morning.

Untouchables: We get a old school Big East matchup with this team of Pittsburgh alumni. You’ll see guys like Gilbert Brown, Levance Fields, Gary McGhee, Bradley Wanamaker, and Talib Zanna. Weirdest part about this squad? Victor Cruz (the NFL player who went to UMass) and Rudy Gay (the former Connecticut player) are the boosters.

8pm: South Semifinal - #2 Overseas Elite vs #3 Ram Nation (ESPN2/WatchESPN)

Overseas Elite: The defending champs include Myck Kabongo (Texas), Paris Horne and D.J. Kennedy (St. John’s), and DeAndre Kane (Iowa State). They’ve also got Errick McCollum, who won a scoring title in Greece and blew up for 82 points in one game while playing in China in 2015, as well as Travis Bader, who left Oakland University with the most made three pointers in NCAA D1 history.

Ram Nation: It’s probably not surprising that this team of VCU alums got this far in the tournament. It’s also not surprising that none of the guys on the squad have particularly notable names. Bradford Burgess, Brandon Rozzell, and Darius Theus all had 20 point outings in Ram Nation’s first two games, and former NBA player Larry Sanders is on the roster, but did not play in their first weekend of action.