For Phil Knight’s 80th birthday, he hosted one of the biggest college basketball tournaments in recent history. The tournament lasted three days; Thanksgiving being one of them. Some of the best teams from college basketball made the trip out to Portland. The tournament consisted of 16 teams, including #1 ranked Duke.

There were two brackets; Victory and Motion. In the victory bracket are Portland, North Carolina, Arkansas, Oklahoma, UConn, Oregon, Michigan State, and DePaul.

Out of the Motion bracket came Portland State, Duke, Butler, Texas, Florida, Stanford, Ohio State, and Gonzaga.

The Victory bracket started in the Moda Center and the Motion bracket started in the Memorial Coliseum. All together there were 8 games a day.

Everyday had its nail-biting games and blowout games. The game that stands out is Florida vs. Gonzaga. It was almost like a home game for Gonzaga since they are a local team. The game ended up going into double overtime but Florida pulled it out.

Other than the local teams such as Portland, Portland State, Gonzaga, and Oregon, Duke, North Carolina, Michigan State and Florida all had a good amount of fans travel to Portland.

Altogether, it was a great tournament. The atmosphere was different than a Blazer game and at some points was louder.