Louisville basketball likely headed to Bahamas for November event

According to college basketball insider Jon Rothstein, Louisville appears poised to replace NC State in a multi-team event that will take place in the Bahamas during November.

In this four-team event, the Cardinals would face Mississippi State in one game, with Maryland and Richmond squaring off in the other. The winners and losers would then play one another in the next round.

Maryland is a top 15 team in pretty much every “way too early” top 25 that’s out there right now, and Mississippi State has also received some early preseason top 25 love. Richmond was picked to win the Atlantic 10 before the start of last season, but a rash of injuries resulted in a disappointing 14-9 campaign for the Spiders.

There are a lot of storylines at play here — NIT revenge game, the potential for Keith Oddo’s old school to face his new one, Mark Turgeon finding a way to be perfectly average in every capacity — but the biggest has to be Louisville’s return to the Bahamas almost exactly a decade after the famous August 2011 exhibition tour.

Games that count against power programs are all well and fine, but we need to find a way to work the Real Deal Shockers and a basketball-playing hotel bellhop into this trip somehow. I won’t stand for anything less.