NCAA Basketball: 2019 Battle 4 Atlantis preview and predictions
By Adam Childs
The Battle 4 Atlantis features possibly the best field of any pre-season NCAA Basketball tournament this year. Who will come out on top of this loaded field with a great resume building week?
While the Maui Invitational has, deservedly so, gotten most of the attention as the premier pre-season NCAA Basketball tournament, the Battle 4 Atlantis has quietly grown into a great tournament of its own. Starting in 2011 the tournament is still new on the national scene but has provided big-time schools a secondary option to going to Hawaii.
Hosted in the beautiful Atlantis Resort, it hosts 8 teams over three days during the Thanksgiving holiday. Harvard was a surprise winner in the inaugural tournament beating UCF in the finals after the Golden Knights upset number four ranked UConn in the semi-finals.
The Villanova Wildcats are the only two-time winner of the event winning in 2013 and 2017. Last year the eventual national champion Virginia Cavaliers defeated the Wisconsin Badgers by seven in a very low scoring game.
Each year there have been at least two ranked teams participating in the event and this year is no different. North Carolina, Seton Hall, Oregon, and Gonzaga are not only ranked but all in the top 13. Michigan is also coming to the Bahamas and they are just outside the top 25. Throw in Iowa State, Alabama, and Southern Mississippi and you get a great field.
Who is the favorite coming and who might be the darkhorse? Which teams have the most pressure and who would be lucky just to get a win? We take a look at each team, breakdown the brackets and make predictions of the 2019 Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas.