Hmm.
Yeah, not the actual NIT. But still an NIT of some sort. We had our eyes on it. And now, it appears its existence is in doubt this year, as the plan to have dozens of college basketball teams briefly travel to the same facilities in Orlando to play a couple games against each other in the middle of a pandemic collapsed under the weight of having dozens of college basketball teams briefly travel to the same facilities in Orlando to play a couple games against each other in the middle of a pandemic. Evidently, calling something a “bubble” with no justification only gets an organizer so far. Take note, future soap salesmen.
It sounds like the answer to this post’s titular question is “no.” ESPN hasn’t changed the website to say the event’s not in New York (it still sometimes asks you in a pop-up ad if you want to register for ticket pre-sale, which will begin in summer 2020). The Orlando plan imploded. Arizona’s evidently going to do their own thing, because they’re the kid whose parents don’t keep a close eye on the Coors Light count anyway, so they can weather the cancelation of that rager at Jessica’s dad’s house by having their buddies over to play kings all night and take a drunk walk at midnight to the Taco Bell drive-through.
We’re down to three teams—Texas Tech (reigning Virtual NIT champions), Cincinnati (please stop calling them Cinci-daddy it’s making us all uncomfortable), and St. John’s (the GOAT). Last I checked, you can have a three-team NIT Tip-Off, but you won’t, because no one remembers how lit the Tri Nations was prior to 2012 when they let Argentina in.
So, yeah, no NIT Tip-Off this year. At least, that’s what it looks like now. And while I definitely could chain myself to Texas’s under-construction-but-soon-to-be-new basketball arena while demanding that Gregg Popovich come up here from San Antonio and host an NIT Tip-Off himself in my backyard (it fits a badminton net, and the neighbors have put in a very nice picnic table with these stump chairs I think they finished themselves and they also have a firepit and yeah our neighbors are very good we don’t do our fair share in this duplex), I don’t know if I should. Might want to keep that ace in the hand.
Stay tuned. But don’t hold onto too much hope. Lose the battle, win the war.
