KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Small College Basketball is proud to announce the participating teams and schedule for the 2023 Champions Classic. This upcoming tournament marks the second year of the Champions Classic, and will take place on Friday, November 17 and Saturday, November 18. Once again, this year's event will be hosted by Northern State University and all games will be held within Wachs Arena in Aberdeen, South Dakota.
The following teams will be participating in this year's event: Keene State College, Stockton University, St. John's University (Minn.), University of Wisconsin-Platteville, Northwest Missouri State University, Upper Iowa University, Northern State University and Emmanuel College (Ga.).
"It's going to be a thrill to bring these eight teams together for a national showcase for college basketball at Wachs Arena on the campus of Northern State," said Small College Basketball President John McCarthy.
"The SCB Champions Classic is truly a special event, and the eyes of college basketball fans throughout the country will be on this event. It's going to be a wonderful weekend of basketball, and we are very grateful to Northern State University and the rabid fans in Aberdeen that help to make this special."
Northern State University's Barnett Center and Wachs Arena is one of the premier NCAA Division II facilities in the nation. The 8,000 seat arena includes an in-ground wood floor installed in 2019, a center-hung digital videoboard/scoreboard, and digital score table displays. The scoreboard, installed by Daktronics, is the largest collegiate center-hung video display system in the state of South Dakota.
This year's event will include four games on Friday and Saturday. Below are the matchups for the 2023 Champions Classic. For more information on the Champions Classic and Small College Basketball please head to
smallcollegebasketball.com. To review the 2022 Champions Classic, please click
here.
For Keene State, the Owls will be looking to build on a 2022-2023 season that took them to new heights - a No. 4 national ranking in the D3hoops.com Top 25 poll - and another appearance in the NCAA Sweet 16 while finishing 28-2, including 16-0 in the Little East Conference. KSC was not ranked in last year's preseason Top 25, but then did appear in every in-season poll thereafter and finished No. 10 in the final voting. The Owls, under ninth-year head coach
Ryan Cain, will return All-Americans
Jeff Hunter and
Octavio Brito, who combined to average 39 points and 20.3 rebounds per game.
Mason Jean Baptiste,
Nate Siow,
Spencer Aronson, and
Tahmeen Dupree will also all be back. Keene State has won two consecutive Little East tournament championships and has won 20 or more games in five out of seven possible seasons under Cain.
"We take pride in playing in the best tournaments at the Division III level and the Small College Basketball Champions Classic is one of them," said Cain.
"We look forward to joining the other teams from Division II and Division III participating in the event to showcase small college basketball. We appreciate John McCarthy inviting us to the event. We are excited for the opportunity to showcase our program against some of the best competition at our level on the national stage, and look forward to watching some of the best teams at the Division II level during the tournament as well."
Friday, November 17
12:00 pm - Keene State vs. Stockton
2:30 pm - St. John's (Minn.) vs. Wisconsin-Platteville
5:00 pm - Northwest Missouri State vs. Upper Iowa
7:30 pm - Northern State vs. Emmanuel (Ga.)
Saturday, November 18
12:00 pm - Stockton vs. St. John's (Minn.)
2:30 pm - Wisconsin-Platteville vs. Keene State
5:00 pm - Northwest Missouri State vs. Emmanuel (Ga.)
7:30 pm - Northern State vs. Upper Iowa
