The Carleton Ravens men’s basketball team will trade its sneakers for flip flops when it travels to the Bahamas to face the University of Kentucky Wildcats in an exhibition game on Aug. 13.
The game is part of a four-game series for Kentucky at the Baha Mar resort in Nassau, Bahamas. Kentucky will also play the Bahamas national team, the Dominican Republic U22 team and Mexico’s Tecnológico de Monterrey, although Carleton will only face Kentucky.
The Wildcats, led by head coach John Calipari, compete in the NCAA’s Southeastern Conference and have won eight NCAA championships, most recently in 2012.
Entering this year’s NCAA tournament as the No. 2 seed, Kentucky was victim of a first round upset to No. 15 seed Saint Peter’s Peacocks.
The National Player of the Year for 2022, Oscar Tshiebwe, is Kentucky’s dominant big-man who led the NCAA with 15.1 rebounds per game—more than any player in the last 30 years.
Ravens head coach Taffe Charles said his side will focus on being as precise as they possibly can against the Wildcats.
“[We need] to overcome their athleticism and their talent with the technical aspects of the game that we hold near and dear to our hearts,” Charles said. “Hopefully we can make it a game where we can compete.”
The Ravens regularly played preseason exhibition games against top NCAA teams until cross-border competition shut down in 2020 due to COVID-19. Most recently, Carleton lost 77-58 to Syracuse University in 2019.
The Ravens tend to defeat NCAA rivals who tour north of the border for preseason games. Carleton beat Wisconsin in 2013, the summer before Wisconsin made it to the national semifinal. Carleton has also defeated Memphis, Baylor, Texas Tech, Wichita State and Alabama.
The Ravens also lost by one point to Kansas in 2008, only months after Kansas won the national championship.
When Duke toured Canada in 2018—with R.J. Barrett, now a star for the New York Knicks, on the roster—the school avoided playing Carleton, drawing resentment from then-Carleton head coach Dave Smart.
“We really wanted to play them,” Smart told Sportsnet in 2018. “I’ve been told coaches are dodging us.”
That wasn’t the case for Kentucky this year.
“I don’t know why [Kentucky has chosen to play] us particularly, other than probably just what we’ve done over the last 20 years for [Canadian] basketball in terms of what our reputation is and how well we’ve done,” Charles said.
Kentucky previously visited the Bahamas for preseason tournaments in 2014 and 2018. NCAA rules allow schools to tour abroad once every four years.
“I know our fans are excited as we once again make a trip to the Bahamas,” Calipari said in a press release. “These games will be a challenge for us and will allow us to grow and see where we are at this point.”
“We have a great mix of returning players and newcomers who want to use this opportunity to begin the preparation it takes to win a national title,” he added.
Charles said planning for the tournament happened in May. Originally, another NCAA school was also supposed to take part in the tournament but ended up cancelling. Charles said he wasn’t sure if the tournament was going to happen at that point.
“[It was a] little bit under cloak and dagger,” he said.
The Ravens have won 16 of the last 19 national championships, including the 2022 championship in Edmonton, Alta., in April. These exhibition games against top teams offer another way for the program to differentiate itself from its rivals in Canadian basketball.
“It does kind of highlight what we kind of sell in terms of recruits,” Charles said. “We’re the premier program in Canada in terms of U Sports. For someone like Kentucky to want to play us and basically [pay] all expenses to go play them, well shoot, it’s a great opportunity for us.”
Featured Image By Spencer Colby.
