Women's Wheelchair Basketball Schedule Highlights

-

The University of Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team will play 26 games over the course of the 2023-2024 season (with 22 of those games being National Wheelchair Basketball Association Intercollegiate Division games.

Its complete schedule can be found here.

All games are livestreamed on the Alabama Adapted Athletics website.

Here are some of the schedule highlights:


Tide Tipoff Presented by RGK on Oct. 13 at Stran-Hardin Arena (University of Alabama)

This is an exhibition, not a game. Also, it features both the men’s and women’s wheelchair basketball teams.

While it does consist of parts of game-simulated scrimmages, it is mostly made up of other events (think the NBA or WNBA All-Star Skill Contests the night before the All-Star Game).

But it is the first opportunity for the community to see the teams in action and the first opportunity for the players to take the court in front of fans, so the excitement from that alone should liven up Stran-Hardin Arena.

Vs. ABC Medical Legends on Oct. 27 (part of the ABC Medical Classic) at Stran-Hardin Arena (University of Alabama)

This is the first game of the season, which brings excitement in and of itself.

The Legends accounted for one of Alabama's two losses, both non-division losses, last season (which Alabama finished with a 25-2 record. Alabama beat the Legends in the two teams' rematch later in the season. That 69-66 win was Alabama's narrowe5st margin of victory of the season.

The Legends -- a co-ed team based out of Birmingham -- also features Brittany Gustafson, who played on the Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team from 2014-2017.

Alabama also plays the Legends on Feb. 23 at Stran-Hardin Arena.


The Alabama wheelchair basketball team beat the Legends 69-66 on Feb. 3, 2023 
(photo courtesy of Alabama Adapted Athletics)

Vs. University of Texas- Arlington on Dec. 8 (part of the Powerade Invitatio880nal) at Sran-Hardin Arena (University of Alabama)

This is Alabama's first National Wheelchair Basketball Assocation Iner collegiate Division game of the season.

Alabama went 16-0 in the National Wheelchair Basketball Association Intercollegiate Division last season. The only other team to finish above .500 in the division was Texas-Arlington.

Alabama and Texas-Arlington met in the national championship game (which Alabama won 88-41).

Alabama plays Texas-Arlington a total of six times over the course of the season (with the other matchups coming on Jan. 12 and Jan. 13 at Texas-Arlington, Jan. 20 at Stran-Hardin Arena, Jan. 26 at the University of Arizona, Feb. 9 at the University of Illinois).



The Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team beat Texas-Arlington 64-33 on Oct. 9, 2022
(photo courtesy of Alabama Adapted Athletics)

Vs. University of Arizona on Dec. 8 (part of the Powerade Invitational) at Stran-Hardin Arena (University of Alabama)

The only team that Alabama plays more often than Texas-Arlington is Arizona, with the two teams meeting seven times over the course of the season.

The two team's will have already played once (on Dec. 2 at University of Wisconsin-Whitewater) and the other five matchups come: on Jan. 12 and Jan. 13 at Texas-Arlington, on Jan. 19 at Stran-Hardin Arena, on Jan. 27 at Arizona, and on Feb. 9 at University of Illinois.

Alabama beat Arizona in all four matchups last season -- by scores of 57-32, 58-25, 62-19, and 76-28.


The Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team beat the Arizona 62-19 on Dec. 3, 2022 (photo courtesy of Alabama Adapted Athletics)

National Championship Tournament on March 7 - March 9 at Stran-Hardin Arena (University of Alabama)

Alabama's schedule and opponent for the National Championship Tournament will depend on seeding based on the regular season results from the NWBA Intercollegiate Division.

The Crimson Tide will be going for its fifth consecutive national championship and ninth overall.


The Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team takes a celebratory selfie after winning the 2023 national championship on March 11 at Stran-Hardin Arena (photo courtesy of Alabama Adapted Athletics)

*I don't know how much longer I am going to keep including this note on my posts, but my journalism experience compels me to keep doing so at least for the time being.

As I stated in my introductory blog post, although I am a student at the University of Alabama, I am not part of the Alabama Adapted Athletics program. So these are my views, and those views do not claim to speak for or represent the Alabama Adapted Athletics program.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Alabama Adapted Athletics Capped Off 2022-2023 Season With a National Championship Sweep

-
Image
The University of Alabama Adapted Athletics program's three teams (men's and women's wheelchair basketball and wheelchair tennis) competed in the 2022-23 season. All three won national championships. Banners on the lightposts outside of Stran-Hardin Arena display the number of national championships (not yet updated to reflect the most recent national championships) that Alabama Adapted Athletics teams have won  (photo by Elliott Lapin) Women's wheelchair basketball cruises to fourth consecutive national championship After finishing the 2022-2023 regular season with an 16-0 record in the National Wheelchair Basketball Association Intercollegiate Division (and a 23-2 overall record, the Alabama women's wheelchair basketball team was the top seed for the NWBA college national championship tournament, which was held at Stran-Hardin Arena on the University of Alabama campus. The Tide cruised to a 78-34 victory over the University of Arizona in the semifinal game on Mar...
Read more

Tyler McKay Returns to Alabama to Take Over Wheelchair Tennis Program

-
Image
The start of the 2023-2024 season saw the return of Tyler McKay. McKay had been a volunteer coach for the University of Alabama wheelchair tennis team for two seasons and then an assistant coach for the next two seasons. After a couple years away from the university, he returned to the Alabama Adapted Athletics program as the head coach for the wheelchair tennis team. McKay takes over for Evan Enquist, who spent eight seasons as the head coach of Alabama’s wheelchair tennis team and left at the end of the 2022-2023 season to become the United States Tennis Association’s National Manager for Wheelchair Tennis. Tyler McKay returns to the Alabama Adapted Athletics program to become the wheelchair tennis head coach. (photo courtesy of Tyler McKay) The search process to find a new head coach followed the standard University of Alabama process. First a search committee was assembled. Then the job was posted on several websites including Indeed and the USTA’s website. Some applicants w...
Read more

Zach Smith Takes Over as the New Operations Coordinator for Alabama Adapted Athletics

-
Image
 Zach Smith is the new Operations Coordinator for the Alabama Adapted Athletics program having started the job in mid-November. Despite having no prior experience with adapted athletics, both Smith and program director Brent Hardin agree that he is the ideal person to take on the job duties. Smith had worked most recently as an operations intern for the Birmingham Barons Minor League Baseball organization and before that had been a lead marketing intern for University of Alabama at Birmingham athletics while finishing up his degree in Hospitality, Sport, and Tourism Management from Troy University. Zach Smith, the new Director of Operations Coordinator for Alabama Adapted Athletics, had worked most recently as an Operations Intern for the Birmingham Barons of Minor League Baseball. “One of the things we tried to really focus on is demonstrated competency. We look for applicants that have been able to prove through their previous positions, internships or responsibilities that ...
Read more