On Tuesday afternoon, ESPN released the brackets for its 2023-24 tournaments, including the ESPN Events Invitational in Orlando, Fla., which features Virginia Tech. The Hokies are matched up with Boise State in the first round at 8 p.m. ET on Thursday, Nov. 23 (Thanksgiving). It’ll be televised on ESPN2 or ESPNU.
It’ll be the first-ever meeting between the Hokies and Broncos, who finished 24-10 (13-5 Mountain West) last season and made their second consecutive NCAA tournament appearance. According to KenPom, they were a top-30 defensive team in the country in 2022-23. Now-Hokie Robbie Beran and Northwestern ousted Boise State in the first round of the Big Dance in Sacramento in March.
Boise State head coach Leon Rice enters his 14th year at the helm, and his 268 wins are the most in program history. He’s 268-155 (.634) since taking over in 2010 and has 10 20-win seasons to his name, including three of the last four. The Broncos are 51-18 (.739) in their last two campaigns.
Virginia Tech will face either Iowa State or VCU in the second round of the tournament on Friday. Assistant coach J.D. Byers was on the Rams staff last season under former head coach Mike Rhoades, who is now at Penn State. Speaking of which, the Nittany Lions are also in the Orlando invitational. They’ll play Texas A&M and former Tech head coach Buzz Williams in a rematch of last year’s NCAA tournament clash, which PSU won.
Along with Texas A&M and Penn State, Butler and Florida Atlantic, fresh off its Final Four appearance, round out the other side of the bracket. The Hokies will see one of those teams on Sunday, Nov. 26, the final day of the event. It’s a very competitive field that will challenge Mike Young & Co. — six of the seven teams made last year’s NCAA tournament. Butler was the outlier.
Virginia Tech is 3-2 all-time against current Mountain West schools:
The tournament is also a homecoming for Virginia Tech guard Hunter Cattoor, an Orlando native. He dreamed of playing on that stage growing up playing in his front yard in Florida, and participated in AAU tournaments at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex, which is where November’s event will be held. The opportunity to play at home in front of friends and family is one of many reasons why he chose to return to Blacksburg.
For more info on the ESPN Events Invitational, including tickets and travel information, click here.
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Plane tix & hotel reservations are booked ! Thanksgiving in warm weather will be odd but fun!
An exciting field. We will be tested.
Maybe the HOKIES can manage winning this one??😉
This is a tough matchup. The Mountain West was better than the ACC this past year and BSU was the second best team in the conference.