Basketball
Kansas State basketball’s Purple Reign alumni team to try its luck again in $1 million TBT
Purple & Black coach Jordan Henriquez-Roberts discusses TBT loss
Purple & Black coach Jordan Henriquez-Roberts talks about Friday night’s 63-52 loss to Team Arkansas in The Basketball Tournament.
Topeka Capital-Journal
The name has changed, and Purple Reign hopes that’s not all when the Kansas State basketball alumni team takes the court next month for the 2024 edition of The Basketball Tournament.
The team formerly known as Purple & Black and composed primarily of former Wildcats, bowed out in the second round of the $1 million winner-take-all summer tournament each of the last two years. But this is arguably its most talented TBT roster yet, headlined by soon-to-be K-State Sports Hall of Fame inductee Jacob Pullen.
The team will again compete in TBT’s Wichita Regional, slated for July 20-24 at Koch Arena on the Wichita State campus. Purple Reign is the No. 4 seed in the eight-team regional and will open against fifth-seeded Team Colorado at 1 p.m. on July 20.
The winner of that first-round game will take on either the top-seeded Aftershocks, a Wichita State alumni team, or No. 8 Midtown Prestige at 8 p.m. on July 22. Other teams in the regional are No. 2 Mass Street (Kansas alumni), No. 3 Florida TNT, No. 6 LA Cheaters and No. 7 Ram Up (Colorado State).
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The Wichita Regional winner will take on the winner of the Houston Regional in the quarterfinals for a chance to advance to the semis and finals in Philadelphia. The 64-team tournament field is divided into eight regionals.
Pullen, who set K-State’s career scoring record between 2007 and 2010, is the only player on Purple Reign’s roster from the Frank Martin coaching era. A majority of the roster played under Bruce Weber, with one other who played for current Wildcat coach Jerome Tang.
Pullen played for Purple & Black in Wichita two years ago and hit a game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer in the first round before they bowed out in the second. Top newcomers to the roster include guards Cartier Diarra (2017-20), Xavier Sneed (2016-20) and Kamau Stokes (2015-19) from Weber’s 2019 Big 12 championship team.
Guard DaJuan Gordon (2019-21) and center Stephen Hurt (2014-16) also are newcomers to the team, as is center Abayomi Iyiola (2022-23) from Tang’s first season. Guard Justin Edwards (2014-16) was a member of the last two Purple & Black squads.
The three non-Wildcats on the roster are former Oklahoma State, SMU and DePaul center Yor Anei, ex-Tennessee State guard Delano Spencer and former Tennessee guard Devon Baulkman.
Head coach and general manager for Purple Reign will again be Jordan Henriquez-Roberts, assistant by fellow former Wildcats Curtis Kelly and Clent Stewart.
Arne Green is based in Salina and covers Kansas State University sports for the Gannett network. He can be reached at agreen@gannett.com or on Twitter at @arnegreen.
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