Phil Knight Invitational: PK80 bracket features exciting potential matchups
By Connor Hope
The Phil Knight Invitational (PK80) will provide a lot of entertainment over the Thanksgiving weekend, and the announced brackets have potentially exciting late-round matchups.
Early Wednesday, the brackets for the PK80 tournament, celebrating Nike co-founder Phil Knight’s 80th birthday, were announced. There were mixed reactions to the definite and potential matchups; however, with seven teams on ESPN staff writer Myron Medcalf’s Way-Too-Early Top 25, the Thanksgiving Weekend tournament is sure to entertain.
Split into separate brackets, the PK80 is essentially two different tournaments being played in Portland, OR.
The Victory Bracket features UNC-Portland and Arkansas-Oklahoma in the top half, while Georgetown-Michigan State and UConn-Oregon make up the bottom. In the Motion bracket, half of the bracket contains Duke-Portland State and Butler-Texas, with Florida-Stanford and Gonzaga-Ohio State composing the other.
Some fans and analysts immediately noticed the prospect of a potential Michigan State-North Carolina matchup, in the finals of the Victory Bracket. Others in the Pacific Northwest expressed their disappointment in the lack of a potential Gonzaga-Oregon matchup.
Other exciting potential matchups in this tournament are an Oregon-North Carolina Final Four rematch, in the finals of the Victory Bracket; UConn vs Georgetown, in a 2nd round bout of former Big East foes; and Gonzaga vs Duke, in the finals of the Motion Bracket.
While no first round matchups immediately jump out as classics, Stanford vs. Florida may be the most entertaining. Stanford is an improved program from last year and Florida is coming off a successful postseason run.
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The Phil Knight Invitational should be one of the better Thanksgiving tournaments, with the potential for some dramatic late round games.