Stillwater Stars ready for bubble showcase

Le' Bryan Nash watched The Basketball Tournament from afar the past few years and always believed Oklahoma State should have a team.

He remembered when he roamed the court inside Gallagher-I ba Arena alongside Marcus Smart and Markel Brown. The Cowboys had talent. They had talent before and after, too.

The Basketball Tournament would be the perfect showcase.

Now, the circumstances are quite different with the COVID-19 pandemic, but a group of former Cowboys and a few others get a chance to prove that inside the bubble of The Basketball Tournament.

“We had a team, too,” Nash said. “We was a good team. Most of these guys want to prove that we're still here, we still want to make a name for ourselves and it's a big stage to pull it off.”

It's currently the only stage.

The 21 st-seeded Stillwater Stars open the tournament at 4 p.m. Saturday on ESP N in Columbus, Ohio, against 12 th-seeded Brother ly Love.

There will be no fans. There will be no media. Just basketball.

The Basketball Tournament—which features a $1 million prize for the winning team — is the only live basketball happening during the pandemic, with quarantined players and coaches.

“I think it's not going to be that much different,” former OSU sharpshooter Thomas Dziagwa said. “When we practice, you don't practice in front of fans. When you have scrimmages with intrasquad stuff in college, you

don't really practice or scrimmage in front of fans.

“So, at the end of the day, it' s just basketball and only 10 guys are all owed on t he court. I don't think it' s rocket science.”

The Stars are coached by former OSU guard and current ESP N analyst Bryn don Manzer.T he team featured a plethora of former Cowboys stars, but due to the coronavirus the roster took a drastic change at the last minute.

Multiple unnamed players tested positive and others pulled out, leaving just seven players on the team. Only three are from OSU — Nash, Dziagwa and Brian Williams. Former Kansas stars Ty shawn Taylor and Naadir Tharpe are joined by Houston's Armoni Brooks and James Banks III, who played at Texas and Georgia Tech.

They've all bonded since reporting early in the week to the quarantine bubble of the tournament.

“It's interesting to say the least,” Williams said. “It's laying in the room playing a game or watching movies and practicing when we can. It's not a lot going on.

“It' s a lot of COVID testing.”