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Indiana to open Maui Invitational against Wake Forest

The burgeoning rivalry against the Demon Deacons will continue on the hardwood in Hawaii.

By Ben Raphel
Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports

We've known for a while that Indiana basketball will be playing in the Maui Invitational this fall. We've even known who the other teams will be. But tonight, we finally got a glimpse of what the bracket will look like, thanks to ESPN's Andy Katz.

The Hoosiers will start out by playing Wake Forest. The Demon Deacons are still in rebuilding mode under second-year head coach Danny Manning, who is still trying to sort out the mess that Jeff Bzdelik left in Winston-Salem. Were the Hoosiers to win this game, they'd play the winner of St. John's and Vanderbilt. A Vandy game would be nice opportunity for revenge after the heartbreaking NCAA baseball tournament loss to the Commodores in May, whereas a St. John's matchup would pit the Hoosiers against Chris Mullin, who just took over at his alma mater this offseason. Were the Hoosiers to reach the finals, they'd potentially face Kansas, who will be loaded as usual. Or they might draw UCLA, which of course would pit Steve Alford against his alma mater. I can't even imagine the hand-wringing on Twitter if the Hoosiers lose that one. Every team at Maui will play three games, so even if IU can't reach the finals, they still have a chance to play some competitive games against teams primarily from power conferences.

This Wake game is the second time that Demon Deacons and Hoosiers will play each other, as they'll also meet in football at Wake's home stadium on Sept. 26. Already Kevin Wilson has created some hype for this contest. So because of this burgeoning new rivalry between the two schools, we asked this question on Twitter during our podcast earlier tonight:


Some of the best suggestions we've received so far include:




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