3 women’s basketball teams withdrew from the Vegas tournament

Three women’s basketball teams have pulled out of a Las Vegas tournament as part of the ongoing fallout from a similar event at the Strip resort over Thanksgiving weekend where safety concerns were raised.

Dayton, Purdue and Texas A&M outside the Las Vegas Holiday Hoops Classic at South Point Arena. Those schools, according to tournament operations director Brett Seymour, have agreed to be additions to his tournament in coordination with officials from Destination Basketball, which ran last month’s Las Vegas Invitational at The Mirage.

“We aim to give our players the opportunity to play the game they love,” Texas A&M coach Johnny Taylor said in a statement. “Due to the circumstances surrounding the Las Vegas Invitational, we have decided to withdraw from the tournament. We are very grateful to Purdue for being so adaptable and for allowing us to host it” instead.

The Las Vegas Invitational has had many problems, including No medical staff on sitewhich led to Auburn freshman Khressa Richardson lying on the court for 50 minutes after falling hard and appearing to hit her head before EMTs arrived.

Indiana coach Terry Morin considered not playing after Richardson’s injury, but now does not. 4 Hoosiers took the court and beat Memphis 79-64. Morin said after the game that she thought women’s basketball “took two steps back” as a result of tournament conditions that also included fans sitting in folding chairs instead of in the stands.

The Las Vegas Holiday Hoops Classic will take place December 19-21 and features Campbell State, Cleveland State, Jacksonville State, Lydenwood and Utah Tech.

“The five teams that would be at South Point were five that we already had,” Seymour said. “Honestly, the other five of us are glad they (the three who dropped out) aren’t there anymore because they like it as a non-power five event. We took those three to help. It’s all right. It’s really better for us because they’re not there this year for this particular event.” .

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Sport Tours International runs the South Point Championships as well as two other tournaments in Las Vegas and has overseen events in the city for 14 years.

Seymour said the three Power Five teams found out they would be playing at South Point instead of Mirage and decided to drop out.

“Destination Basketball has contracts with Purdue, Texas A&M, and Dayton,” Seymour said. “We weren’t….we were surprised that they claimed not to know.”

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AP Women’s College Basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/womens-college-basketball, https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-womens-college-basketball-poll, https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-womens-college-basketball-poll / twitter.com / AP_Top25