LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Louisville males’s basketball followers can achieve an early take a look at a extremely anticipated 2026-27 Cardinals squad when it performs two exhibition video games in opposition to worldwide competitors as a part of the 2026 Baha Mar Hoops Summer League this July on the Baha Mar resort, bdG Sports introduced Tuesday.
The four-day journey runs July 27-30 with the Cardinals enjoying video games on Tuesday, July 28 and Wednesday, July 29 in opposition to groups from The Bahamas. Both contests will happen on the Baha Mar Convention, Arts and Entertainment Center on-site on the resort.
Louisville’s schedule follows (Times are jap and topic to vary.)
Tuesday, July 28 Louisville vs. Bahamas – 2 p.m. ET
Wednesday, July 29 Louisville vs. Bahamas – midday
The journey marks the second time in three summers that Louisville head coach
Pat Kelsey has introduced his Cardinals group to the Baha Mar to take part within the occasion. With important roster turnover in faculty basketball, NCAA guidelines now allow groups to take overseas excursions each summer time. Arkansas, Cincinnati, South Carolina, Texas A&M and Valparaiso had been not too long ago introduced as different contributors within the within the 2026 Baha Mar Hoops Summer League, which runs July 28-Aug. 10. However, NCAA guidelines nonetheless solely allow groups to play in opposition to worldwide competitors.
“This is a business trip for our team,” stated Kelsey. “The chances to get 10 additional practices and a pair of games under our belt before the school year begins is absolutely invaluable. When we played in the Baha Mar Hoops Summer League two years ago, we saw what a great benefit that extra court time could have on our team, and we are looking for a similar effect with this quick trip to Nassau.”
The new-look Cardinals boast one the nation’s greatest portal lessons, that includes former Kansas heart
Flory Bidunga (13.3 factors, 9.0 rebounds and a pair of.6 blocks), Oregon guard
Jackson Shelstad (15.6 factors, 4.9 assists),Arkansas wing
Karter Knox (8.2 factors, 4.5 rebounds) and Iowa ahead Álvaro Folgueiras (8.4 factors, 3.6 rebounds). Louisville returned guards
Adrian Wooley and
London Johnson and added freshmen
Obinna Ekezie Jr.,
Boyuan Zhang and
Isaac Ellis because the roster options 9 newcomers whole.
The fifth-annual occasion is managed by bdG Sports, a Kentucky-based sports activities and leisure administration agency which yearly operates 20 collegiate males’s and ladies’s basketball video games at Baha Mar every November.
“Interest in foreign tours has exploded this summer,” stated Brooks Downing, founder and president of bdG Sports. “With rosters largely turning over in today’s collegiate environment, combined with the significant Name, Image and Likeness investment in each roster, this is an affordable way to protect that investment and get a big head start on the new season.”
TICKETS, ROOMS & FAN PACKAGES The journey serves as the primary alternative to catch the Cardinals in motion whereas additionally having fun with the wonderful Baha Mar resort. Louisville followers all for attending can go to
www.bahamarhoops.com/summer time for info on tickets, rooms and VIP packages.
ABOUT BAHA MAR HOOPS Each November across the Thanksgiving vacation, Baha Mar performs host to Baha Mar Hoops, one of many largest regular-season occasions within the sport of school basketball. Twenty NCAA Division I males’s and ladies’s groups go to the beautiful resort annually to compete in considered one of three basketball tournaments. In whole, 20 video games will probably be performed over an 11-day span.
Each August, the resort additionally holds the Baha Mar Hoops Summer League, providing NCAA groups exhibition video games in opposition to worldwide competitors as a part of a overseas tour. The resort has welcomed males’s basketball groups from Kentucky, Louisville, Nevada, Penn State, Rhode Island and Xavier for summer time exhibition excursions lately.
ABOUT BDG SPORTS bdG Sports is a sports activities and leisure chief with a dynamic and ever-growing occasion administration portfolio with a cornerstone in basketball {and professional} golf and an expansive focus towards baseball. The agency boasts an occasion schedule that has delivered important financial impression to a number of communities all through North America and the Caribbean whereas that includes broadcasts to viewers throughout the globe.
In basketball, bdG has a prolonged historical past of manufacturing premium faculty basketball content material. From summer time exhibition excursions to a number of high-profile in-season tournaments and neutral-site occasions, bdG will contract greater than 100 regular-season males’s and ladies’s Division I basketball video games yearly. It boasts the file for the biggest hoops crowd in Nevada state historical past (Duke-Gonzaga 2021 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas), the second-most watched sport since 2008 (Arkansas-Illinois on Thanksgiving Day 2024 with 5.1 million viewers) and one of many largest occasions within the sport, 20 males’s and ladies’s groups competing yearly at Baha Mar Hoops. bdG is the one third-party operator which manages a convention event, helping The Big West Men’s & Women’s Championships every March in Henderson, Nevada.
In skilled golf, bdG owns and operates two season-opening Korn Ferry Tour tournaments, The Bahamas Golf Classic at Atlantis Paradise Island and The Bahamas Great Abaco Classic at The Abaco Club, each televised by the Golf Channel and that includes $1 million purses.
For NCAA baseball, bdG owns and operates the Atlantis Collegiate Baseball Series.