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The rules for being eligible to play in The Basketball Tournament are simple: Get seven committed players and get 100 fan votes.
YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles alumni squad has surpassed those limits and are now eligible for their second crack at the $2 million winner-take-all prize.
With 7 players and 100+ votes, we are officially ELIGIBLE for a bid into @thetournament! Keep those votes coming! https://t.co/MklpAZsolV
— Golden Eagles Alumni (@GoldenEaglesTBT) April 19, 2017
.@MarquetteMBB alumni squad @GoldenEaglesTBT are now #TBT2017 eligible! https://t.co/rZEDJ0bORi pic.twitter.com/SeeiaSN2MT
— TBT (@thetournament) April 19, 2017
Time to get hyped: @MarquetteMBB alumni squad @GoldenEaglesTBT are #TBT2017 eligible and ready to BALL! pic.twitter.com/HGMCUVnL9H
— TBT (@thetournament) April 20, 2017
Last year’s squad advanced to the Elite Eight of TBT, and back for more is Maurice Acker, Dwight Buycks, Davante Gardner, Darius Johnson-Odom, and Jerel McNeal as well as Golden Eagles Alumni coach Wesley Matthews.
Joining those three players are Trent Lockett, Trend Blackledge, and Juan Anderson. Officially, Lockett isn’t a newcomer to the squad as he was on the roster in 2016, but he ended up not appearing in a game. Blackledge was on Team Utah for whatever reason last season, while Anderson will be making his TBT debut fresh off his LNBP Finals MVP for Fuerza Regia.
Juan Toscano (@worldwidenito) fue nombrado el MVP de la Final de la @LNBPoficial #FinalLNBP #CreeEnTuJuego pic.twitter.com/B3QofNefuH
— Rodolfo Ramírez (@Fito_Rmz) April 4, 2017
As of Monday morning, the Marquette squad had the seventh most votes of any team in TBT, and the second most in the Midwest Region. They trail only Hilton Magic Legends, the team of Iowa State alumni, and have a more than 600 vote margin on the cut line, as the top nine teams in the Midwest will get into the field.
There’s still more than a month of voting left to go and Golden Eagles Alumni has 825 votes. Last year, they needed over 1,000 votes to get into the tournament, so if you haven’t voted yet, go vote right now! Then go recruit your friends and family to vote for GEA, because you could get a share of the prize money if the squad ends up winning the $2 million prize.