Sports
College basketball rankings: North Carolina, Arkansas face tough tests in Battle 4 Atlantis – CBS Sports
Play Now
Football Pick’em
Play Now
College Pick’em
Dominate your league!
A Daily SportsLine Betting Podcast
With the Maui Invitational now in the books, and Purdue emerging from the eight-team event with a trophy and the sport’s best resume, it’s time to turn our attention to the Bahamas, where the Battle 4 Atlantis semifinals will be held Thursday inside Imperial Arena.
Here’s the schedule:
That’s two games featuring the teams ranked 17th (Memphis), 18th (North Carolina) and 21st (Arkansas) in Thursday morning’s updated CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 daily college basketball rankings. The first semifinal is a rematch of the title game of the 2016 NCAA Tournament that Villanova won on Kris Jenkins’ tie-breaking 3-pointer at the buzzer. The second semifinal is a contest between historical regional rivals that share a border and used to play annually in the 1990s when Larry Finch was leading the Tigers and Nolan Richardson was in charge of the Razorbacks.
Arkansas leads the all-time series, 11-10.
The Hogs and Tigers haven’t played since January 2003.
The North Carolina-Villanova game will look a lot different than it looked when the two schools met in the title game of the 2016 NCAA Tournament, largely because both Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame coaches who manned the sideline on that Monday night — North Carolina’s Roy Williams and Villanova’s Jay Wright — have since retired. Hubert Davis and Kyle Neptune, respectively, are now in charge of the Tar Heels and Wildcats. Each is coming off of a disappointing season and could certainly use three victories at the Battle 4 Atlantis to help convince fans that last year was more of an anomaly than a sign of things to come.
© 2004-2023 CBS Interactive. All Rights Reserved.
CBS Sports is a registered trademark of CBS Broadcasting Inc. Commissioner.com is a registered trademark of CBS Interactive Inc.
Images by Getty Images and US Presswire
