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One of the lingering questions as far as scheduling goes for the 2018-19 Wake Forest basketball team has been which early-season non-conference tournament will the Deacs compete in. That question was answered earlier this week when the official site announced that Wake will be headed to the Myrtle Beach Invitational from November 15-18th at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, SC.
We will compete in the inaugural Myrtle Beach Invitational this November!
— Wake Basketball (@WakeMBB) April 11, 2018
INFO: https://t.co/xpPF36hYEx pic.twitter.com/r3wH4ez2w9
Seven of the eight teams have been announced thus far, and I would expect the eighth team to be a local school out of the Carolinas to wrap up the field.
A quick look at the teams in the tournament shows that Wake has some history with quite a few of them. The Deacs have squared off with West Virginia and Saint Josephs in the NCAA Tournament recently (falling to each of them in the Chris Paul years). Wake also defeated Cal State Fullerton in 2008 when it won the 76 Classic.
I looked back at the final KenPom rankings for this past year to get an idea of where the teams ranked:
Of the teams announced so far based on last year’s KenPom final ranking:
— Riley Johnston (@BSD_RaJohnston) April 11, 2018
West Virginia - 12
Western Kentucky - 47
Wake Forest - 89
UCF - 111
St Joes - 116
VALPO - 150
Cal State Fullerton - 162
Random team - ???
Overall this should be a good field for a Wake team that will be looking to build a solid non-conference resume before entering ACC play. I would expect at least a 2-1 record and ideally Deacs will make it to the finals and have a chance to play for a trophy early on.