Trio of former Wildcats teaming up at The Basketball Tournament

It’s not The Bluegrass Boys, but there’s going to be at least one team this summer with a heavy Kentucky influence.

Former Kentucky Wildcats Archie Goodwin, Marquis Teague, and Marcus Lee will all suit up for Eberlein Drive at this summer’s The Basketball Tournament (TBT) event. They will be a No. 1 seed in the eighth edition of TBT, which is scheduled to begin on July 16 in Wichita, KS. Eberlein Drive, an eight-time participant in the tournament, will also feature two former Western Kentucky players in A.J. Slaughter and Jeremy Evans, former Eastern Kentucky forward Nick Mayo, and former Georgetown College guard Eljay Cowherd.

The event will consist of 64 teams split into four 16-team regions: Wichita, West Virginia, Colombus, and Illinois. The final rounds will be held from July 31-August 1 at the University of Dayton.

This @EberleinDrive roster is absolutely INSANE 😳

They’ll be the No. 1 seed in Wichita July 16-20! pic.twitter.com/TbWFo0ajGt

— TBT (@thetournament) June 24, 2021

Below are the dates for each region, which will be broadcast across the ESPN networks.

Columbus: July 23-27
West Virginia: July 17-21
Wichita: July 16-20
Illinois: July 24-28

The major draw of TBT is the $1 million winner-take-all prize. Overseas Elite has already won the event four different times throughout its brief history, but won’t be participating this summer. A Marquette alumni team, the Golden Eagles, will look to defend its 2020 Championship.

Among the other squads taking on the event include alumni teams for Ohio State, Dayton, Xavier, Buffalo, N.C. State, Purdue, Tennessee, Miami (FL), West Virginia, Marshall, Auburn, Wichita State, Arkansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, Creighton, Illinois, Syracuse, and Oregon, along with plenty of other “All-Star”-like rosters made up of players from Divison III schools to overseason hoopers, and everyone in between.

There will be plenty of familiar faces at the tournament this year that the Big Blue Nation might remember from years past. Chris Lofton and Wayne Chism from Tennessee, Jared Sullinger (Ohio State), John Jenkins (Vanderbilt), Bryce Brown (Auburn), Fletcher Magee (Wofford), Dusty Hannahs (Arkansas), Vander Blue (Marquette), and many more.

A team by the name of “Tubby Time” comes in as the 10-seed in the Illinois region, which will honor head coach Tubby Smith by crafting a team made up of his former players.

Marcus Lee has participated in this tournament before, doing so as a member of The Bluegrass Boys back in 2019 when TBT came to Lexington, and again in 2020 with Team Detroit. The Bluegrass Boys didn’t exactly live up to expectations (while the DeMarcus Cousins-managed team did) but Lee is back and on a team stacked with talent. Along with Teague and Goodwin, those three will also team up with former North Carolina Tar Heels, JP Tokoto.