Rutgers Basketball To Face Off Versus Tennessee, Notre Dame in 2025 Players Era Festival
As was announced back in late January, Rutgers Basketball is once again set to participate in the 2025 Players Era Tournament out in Las Vegas, Nevada and earlier today the first two games of the multi-day event have been leaked.
Rutgers is all set to take on one of the newcomer programs in the Tennessee Volunteers, as the two programs will be the first game of the entire event per a report from UMHoops.
The game is set to take place at 1pm ET on Monday, November 24th, 2025 and will take place at Park MGM Las Vegas. This matchup will be the third ever between the two programs, as the Volunteers hold a 2-0 series lead over the Scarlet Knights. The most recent game took place back during the 1992-93 seasons, where Tennessee beat Rutgers by a final score of 87-79 inside of what is now called Jersey Mike’s Arena.
Along with that, Rutgers is also set to take on former Big East Conference mate Notre Dame, as the two are set for a rematch of last year’s 85-84 overtime thriller which resulted in a Scarlet Knights victory.
This game is set to take place on Tuesday, November 26th and will also tip-off at 1pm ET. There will also be a third game for each team, but that matchup is dependent on the results of the first matchups.
WHAT OTHER TEAMS ARE IN THE PLAYERS ERA?
Along with Rutgers Basketball, the tournament will also return each of the six of the seven other programs that participated in the inaugural event last November in Alabama, Creighton, Houston, Notre Dame, Oregon, and San Diego State. The lone program that will not return is Texas A&M.
However this go around there will be a lot of expansion to the multi-day event surrounding Thanksgiving weekend, as the Players Era will have 18 teams in total, with Auburn, Baylor, Gonzaga, Iowa State, Kansas, Michigan, St. Joseph’s, St. John’s, Syracuse, Tennessee, and UNLV all now joining in on the fun.
Now the tournament previously guaranteed each participating team $1 million in NIL money and offered a chance to earn another $1 million for that team that won it all. According to a report, this year’s prize pot will be upwards of $20 million.
In the inaugural tournament this past Fall, Rutgers finished with a record of 1-2, defeating the likes of Notre Dame in a 85-84 overtime thriller before losing 95-90 to Alabama and 81-77 to Texas A&M.
Check out the full list of games confirmed for the 2025-26 Rutgers Basketball schedule HERE!
