by Penny Hardaway, sitting in front of a room full of Memphis Tigers fans at Brookhaven Pub & Grill on 8 July, explained the challenges of compiling a strong non-conference schedule.
“It’s difficult because we want to play a number of other teams, it just won’t match the schedule,” he said.
That is when a supporter from the standing room only led crowd.
“Ut!” He said, referring to the University of Tennessee.
Hardaway didn’t miss a beat.
“Exactly,” he joked. “That would be a good thing to get UT rivement again.”
A sturdy applause followed. Hardaway put together the fourth most difficult non-conference schedule of the nation in 2024-25, and the slate of the coming season will be a different glove. It includes home games against Baylor, Vanderbilt, UNLV and San Francisco, as well as gone data with Louisville, Mississippi State and Ole Miss. The Tigers will also be confronted with Purdue at the Baha Mar Hoops Championship in the Bahamas, together with Texas Tech of Wake Forest.
The last time the Tigers and Vols met was 2019, when Memphis won in Knoxville. During a fan event in the Bluff City in April, Tennessee coach Rick Barnes repeated that he has no plans to agree with matches against the Tigers in the near future.
“We haven’t talked about that for a few years now. It is nowhere to be spoken,” he said. “With the changes, new teams that come in our competition (the SEC) – we are just out of playing historically the most difficult, best conference ever ever. So everything we do will be based on where we feel that our competition is and what we should do.”
Later Hardaway said that most teams approaching Memphis about planning home and home series are open.
I can actually say, for most teams – such as Baylor and Louisville – there are teams that want to play, “he said.” They see us as a team that they have to play early to challenge their team. So that is a huge compliment. But then there are also people who just won’t do it. They feel that they might be bigger than we do and that they don’t have to have that game. “
Is Penny Hardaway’s Memphis Basketball Roster Set?
The question for Hardaway was whether his schedule of 2025-26 was fully set.
“The schedule is ready, at the moment,” he told reporters after the third “Tigers on Tour” fan event of the school.
The follow -up question was a bit more specific and aroused a different answer.
“We have to grow up,” he said. “So we are still looking for someone else.”
Memphis has so far signed 13 players and left the eighth year coach with two open fairs for the coming season. Only two Tigers-Aaron Bradshaw and Simon Majok-Being larger than 6-8. Majok, a resident of Zuid -Sudan who has played professionally in Serbia for the past three years, signed at Memphis on 30 June. Majok has not yet reported to the campus, and Hardaway has no expected arrival date.
But he is convinced that Majok, a 7-footer, can help the Tigers.
“We have to sort out his game,” said Hardaway. “We only saw a small film, but as soon as he gets into practice or comes to the gym and we work it out, we will see where he is needed.”
Reach sportswriter Jason Munz on jason.munz@commercialapeal.com and follow him @Munzly on X.
