re: Tide Hoops | 31-6 (16-2)

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The Buzziest NBA Prospects at the PK85 Tournament

A huge contingent of NBA executives and scouts will descend on Portland this week for the Nike-sponsored PK85 tournament (Phil Knight Invitational). This year’s primary early-season college basketball extravaganza includes 16 teams, two different brackets in honor of company founder Phil Knight’s 85th birthday and, naturally, a wealth of future NBA players who will have a say in how the 2023 draft goes down. Due to the fact there’s not much else competing for teams’ attention during Thanksgiving week—many high-level decision-makers will head directly to Portland from the Maui Invitational—the PK85 is quite arguably the biggest scouting event of the season.

Players will have a huge opportunity to leave impressions here, and I will be in attendance all week to keep tabs. Here’s what I’m looking forward to as Thursday draws close. Keep in mind that this is not a list of the five best prospects in the event, simply a selection of buzzy names who I’m most curious about entering Thursday’s slate of games.

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Brandon Miller, Alabama

Height: 6'9" | Weight: 200 | Age: 19 | Freshman

On the heels of a positive spring and good showings in practice, Miller had been one of the buzzier freshmen names circulating amongst NBA scouts entering the season. The 6' 9" forward has opened November in strong form, averaging 20.3 points and 9.3 rebounds on 50% shooting from the field and 51.7% from three, while getting to the foul line 20 times in four games. He’s coming off his best game of the season, scoring 28 points and pouring in seven threes last week against Jacksonville State. He made shots off the dribble and catch while using his length to impact the game around the rim and defensively. The motor concerns that occasionally followed Miller as a younger player seem to be a non-issue, and he’s legitimately skilled and agile enough to play small forward at the NBA level.

Granted, like many teams, Alabama has played a cupcake schedule so far, positioning the PK85 as Miller’s first serious test of the season. The Crimson Tide open Thursday night against a physical, experienced Michigan State team that will presumably try to run Miller off the line and force him to make plays off the dribble and in the paint. More than half of his shot attempts so far have been three-pointers, and he’s not a highly explosive finisher at the rim, so this three-game tournament is a big opportunity to learn more about his tendencies and weaknesses, considering the quality of competition.

Miller is quite old for a freshman—he turned 20 on Tuesday—but his combination of size and skill should mitigate those concerns a bit as long as he continues to produce. This is a big week for him to make his lottery case, and I’m curious to take a longer look at him up close.

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Matchup with Michigan State, Tom Izzo a 'surreal' moment for Nate Oats

The Alabama men’s basketball team will face 12th-ranked Michigan State in the first round of the Phil Knight Invitational on Thursday, Nov. 24. The Thanksgiving Day game will be a matchup between top-20 teams but also a surreal moment for Crimson Tide coach Nate Oats.

Oats, now in his fourth season in Tuscaloosa, Ala., worked Michigan State camps when he was an assistant coach at Wisconsin-Whitewater. Landing a head coaching job at Romulus (Mich.) High School in 2002, he would spend the next decade frequenting East Lansing and Tom Izzo’s basketball facilities. More than 20 years later, he will face the Spartans in Portland.

“He’s a guy I’ve always looked up to,” Oats said Tuesday night. “I grew up in Wisconsin. I moved to the Detroit area to take a high school job. And honestly, part of it was I was right there in the same state. He was always great to me when I worked camps before I took the Romulus job. When I took the Romulus job, I was up there all the time. I’d take the team up there to team camp. We’d go up and watch his practices. I’ve always looked up to him.

“He was always great to me as a high school coach.”

Izzo, who took over the Michigan State men’s basketball program the same time as Nick Saban was hired as the Spartans’ football coach, was essentially a reference for Oats before he got the job at Alabama. Now, the two coaches will face off in one of the best multi-team events.

“I think Greg (Byrne) called Izzo before he hired me to kind of ask him about me,” Oats said. “In a small way, he helped me get the job. It’s not like I had a real mentor that I worked a long time for. Coach (Bobby) Hurley got me into this, and he’s the only guy I’ve ever worked under in Division I. But I spent 11 years in Michigan going up to Michigan State frequently, often. They were always helpful.”

Michigan State enters the game with a 3-1 record having defeated Northern Arizona, Kentucky and Villanova. The Spartans’ only loss was a 1-point defeat to Gonzaga. But Izzo said this week that the Crimson Tide presents a completely different challenge than the previous three games. He pointed to UA’s 46 three-point attempts against Jacksonville State, 21 of which were makes, and labeled Oats’ team as dangerous and very long, especially its frontcourt.

“I mean, it’s 6-11, 6-10, 6-10,” Izzo said. “The Miller kid is everybody’s two or three pick in the draft. Long, athletic, can shoot threes. Some people compare him to a Kevin Durant. So it is a talented team. Miller’s averaging a double-double with 18 and 10.

“The Sears kid that they got in from Ohio U has been playing very well. But the Quinerly kid, who transferred from Villanova, had been hurt, and he might be the consummate point guard. They also have two other freshmen in Griffen and Bradley that are very, very good shooters. So they shoot a lot of threes. They’re long and athletic. They play very good defensively.

“Nate’s worked our camp for 10 years, so he knows a lot about our program, and I have followed his. So I think it’ll be the fourth different prep when you see a Gonzaga, then you see a Kentucky and then you see Villanova. This team is different than all those teams by a long shot, and yet, it will give us another good indication on where we are, what we need to get better at. I’m looking forward to it.”

Alabama (4-0) hasn’t faced a Power 5 team entering Feast Week, so the battle with Michigan State – and the ensuing games in the PKI – will be the first test for a young Crimson Tide roster that features seven newcomers, three of which have been in the starting lineup each of the first four games. But Oats likes his squad and is eager to see how it handles the Spartans.

But it will also serve as a reminder of how far he’s come since his days in Michigan.

“It is a little surreal,” Oats said. “I mean, the good thing is I don’t have to play Coach Izzo. He’s got a lot more wins than I’ve got. I’ve got some pretty good players that I get to coach. My players get to play his players, and we’ve both got pretty good players, so it should be a pretty good game. But it’ll be a little different going down and shaking his hand before this game.”

The Alabama-Michigan State game will tip off at 9:30 p.m. CT on Thursday and air on ESPN.

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Creighton shot like 10 more free throws than Arky last night and Miss said in the post game “he has never seen a free throw discrepancy like that”
just last year they shot like 20 more FTs vs us when we played them at Arkansas.

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SEC isn't looking too great out of conference so far Rockiee

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Maybe Alabama can do our part by beating some teams in Portland.

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