RollingTideBlog

After winning the season opener 87-33 over Lakeshore in the early afternoon of Oct. 28, the Alabama men’s wheelchair basketball team lost its second game 77-65 later that afternoon to the ABC Medical Legends  to open the season going 1-1 in the ABC Medical Classic at home at Stran-Hardin Arena. That second game featured abundant connections between the two teams. The game’s leading scorer was the Legends’ Michael Auprince, who finished with 28 points. Auprince played for the Alabama men’s wheelchair basketball team from 2015 to 2019 under current head coach Ford Burttram and is in his second season as the team’s assistant coach. In addition to current head coach Ford Burttram, the national champion 2017-2018 Alabama men's wheelchair basketball team featured players Michael Auprince and Sean Burns and assistant coach Ryan Hynes, all three of whom played against the team on Oct. 28 as part of the ABC Medical Legends (photo by Elliott Lapin) Auprince was also the game’s leadi...

The University of Alabama wheelchair tennis team is coming off seven consecutive national championships. But it is off to a 2-4 start to the 2023-2024 season. The season began with the team going 0-2 at the San Diego State Tournament in mid-September, losing 3-0 to San Diego State and 2-1 to Auburn (with the lone point coming from freshman Martha Harris’s tiebreak singles victory). “We learned a lot as a team. That was our first match together,” said first-year coach Tyler McKay . “Our whole goal going in was to gain experience, learn, try to improve, and, overall, I feel like we went and played hard and gave it our best shot, and it was a good starting off point for a program that is kind of in kind of a rebuild mode.” The team is without three-time Tier 1 wheelchair tennis national champion Thomas Venos who graduated this past spring. This year’s team has only two players (Harris and junior Max Barbier). It had three players the year before and seven players two years ago. ...

For the first time, the Alabama Adapted Athletics program  will start charging admission for events taking place at Stran-Hardin Arena on campus. Stran-Hardin Arena is home to the University of Alabama men's and women's wheelchair basketball teams (photo by Elliott Lapin) Between the men’s and women’s wheelchair basketball teams, Alabama will host six weekend tournaments/showcases (with most of those events featuring both teams). The price for a ticket to one of those events is ten dollars per person  or 50 dollars per person for a full season pass . “We’re at a point now where the product we’re delivering is something that I think warrants ticketing,” said Alabama Adapted Athletics Director of Operations Davis Faulkner. See also: Men's Wheelchair Basketball Season Preview Faulkner cited the sparkler/pyrotechnic effect show that accompanies pregame player introductions as an example of something the program will use the additional revenue to improve and add more of. ...

The University of Alabama men’s wheelchair basketball team is coming off a national championship season. Coach Ford Burttram noticed that the energy and work ethic was stronger this past summer than it had been the previous two summers when the team was coming off losses in the national championship game, though he stopped short of direct attribution. The University of Alabama men's wheelchair basketball team celebrates after beating the University of Arizona 73-68 in the national championship game on March 18, 2023  (photo courtesy of Alabama Adapted Athletics) The 2023-2024 season begins with the Tide Tipoff exhibition on Oct. 13 at home at Stran-Hardin Arena. The first tournament of the season is the ABC Medical Classic, also at Stran-Hardin Arena, on Oct. 28 and 29. The ABC Medical Classic and the Jalapenos Invitational, which will take place at Stran-Hardin Arena on Nov. 11, both consist of non-division National Wheelchair Basketball Association (NWBA) games. Alabama’s...