Key Points
Bullet point summary by AI
- The Player's Era Championship expands to 24 teams with two bracketed events in Las Vegas this season.
- ESPN will broadcast all 37 games across its networks, giving participating teams valuable tournament experience before March Madness.
- The format change eliminates last year's confusion over third-day matchups, promising clearer storytelling for fans and viewers.
The college basketball season is still months away but some of the signature non-conference events are starting to fill up. The biggest new kid on the block is the Player's Era Championship, a MTE designed to get marquee programs to come to Las Vegas to play non-conference games in exchange for huge NIL checks.
The Player's Era began as an eight-team event in 2024 before expanding to 18 teams last year, with eventual national champion Michigan making their mark with a 40-point blowout of Gonzaga in the title game. The format was a bit confusing as the matchups for the third day were decided based on point differentials, meaning ticketed fans and TV viewers had to wait late into the night on Day 2 to find out the final matchups.
That problem will go away now that ESPN has partnered with the Player's Era Championship to both expand the field and make it a bracketed event. The Player's Era will now comprise two separate events: the Players Era Eight in the week of Nov. 16 and the Players Era 16 Thanksgiving week, which is otherwise known in college basketball circles as Feast Week.
Who is playing in The 2026 Players Era Championships?
The Players Era has a lot of familiar faces back in the mix along with some new ones. The Players Era 8 is headlined by Florida, which retains a lot of key players and is poised to be in the mix for the No. 1 spot in the preseason Top 25.
The Gators are joined by Kansas, Houston, Auburn, West Virginia, Notre Dame, Rutgers and UNLV in the eight team event. Houston is a perennial Final Four contender under Kelvin Sampson while Bill Self and Kansas reloaded this year with an almost-entirely new roster headlined by freshman five-star recruit Tyran Stokes.
The Players Era 16 is once again anchored by Michigan, which is looking to defend its title here as well as its national championship. Dusty May was able to keep a few key pieces from the title-winners, including Final Four Most Outstanding Player Elliott Cadeau and guard Trey McKenney, while dipping into the transfer portal and high school ranks to reinforce his roster.
Other teams joining the Wolverines in Las Vegas for the Thanksgiving tournament include Alabama, Gonzaga, St. John's, Louisville, Oregon, Creighton, Tennessee, Iowa State, Texas Tech, Baylor, Miami, TCU, Maryland, Kansas State and San Diego State.
Since this is now a bracketed event, teams playing in the Players Era 8 will be in Las Vegas for three games while the Players Era 16 will play four games. The experience figures to be valuable for teams participating both in a financial sense as well as the chance to go through a tournament-style event well ahead of March Madness.
ESPN will broadcast all 37 games of the Players Era Championships across its family of networks. Dates for the games and the brackets will be unveiled in the coming weeks.
More college basketball news and analysis:
Add us as a preferred source on Google