LAHAINA, Hawaii — The Arizona Wildcats weren’t paid a dime to appear in the Maui Invitational this week. In fact, they gave up revenue from three McKale Center games to make room on their schedule.
It was a deal Arizona couldn’t refuse.
College basketball’s most prestigious regular season event has a way of paying its teams back in intangibles.
The first is the setting. You see it splashed on ESPN every Thanksgiving week, or maybe you’re one of the lucky fans who has experienced it first-hand: Smack in between the historic town of Lahaina and the stunning beach resorts of Kaanapali sits the Lahaina Civic Center, literally across the Honoapi’ilani Highway from a beach park that fronts the shimmering Pacific Ocean.
Then there’s the hospitality: Participants’ free time is rare with three games in three days, but players are treated to a private luau two days before the event and a pre-tournament banquet the day before. They stay in one of the major Kaanapali hotels where nothing is lacking.
But most important, to the teams, is the competition. This year, the Maui Invitational brought in three top-10 teams, and the Wildcats ensured they would play two of them by beating Iowa State on Monday. Third-ranked Gonzaga rallied to beat the UA 91-74 on Tuesday, setting up Wednesday’s late-night, third-place game between the Wildcats and No. 8 Auburn.
The competition has given the Wildcats a significant boost to their strength of schedule and an accurate barometer of where they stand. Arizona now has a full week to watch video of the games and work on what they learned before playing again, on Nov. 29 against Georgia Southern at McKale Center.
After Arizona’s first game, a 71-66 win over Iowa State on Monday, coach Sean Miller found the Wildcats have the kind of heart and desire to win that he suspected when he started assembling them last summer.
“I think we’ve got a really hungry group of guys that are trying to prove that maybe we’re a little bit better than people have given us credit for,” Miller said. “That remains to be seen, but I think that motivation has been really healthy. We have very few ups and downs and that consistency, if we can keep that up, that will take us as far as we can go.”
It’s unknown if the lessons from Maui will translate to success in the Pac-12 season and beyond. But after three games in paradise, the Wildcats have a map to get there.
That’s the kind of payoff they can use all season.
