LAS VEGAS — The Gonzaga Bulldogs will spend Thanksgiving week in a familiar place — Las Vegas — for the Players Era Festival, touted as the most expensive regular-season event in college basketball history, with an estimated $20 million in NIL payouts to be distributed among the teams. On Monday, the Zags announced who they’ll face on the first two days of the three-day, 18-team tournament.

Gonzaga will open the Players Era Festival against Alabama on Monday, Nov. 24, at 6:30 p.m. The following day, the Zags will meet the Maryland Terrapins, also at 6:30 p.m. The MGM Grand Garden Arena and Michelob Ultra Arena will host the tournament, but GU’s specific game locations haven’t been announced.

Wednesday, Nov. 26, will feature consolation and third-place games starting at 4 p.m., with the championship game set for 6:30 p.m. CBS Sports reports that Warner Bros. Discovery will broadcast the tournament, with games airing on TNT, TBS and streaming on HBO Max.

Each of the 18 teams participating in the tournament is guaranteed $1 million in NIL payouts, with an additional $1 million going to the tournament champion.

The Bulldogs-Crimson Tide matchup is one college basketball fans will have circled, as both programs are currently projected to be ranked in the preseason Top 25. ESPN’s Way-Too-Early Top 25, released Monday morning, has Gonzaga ranked No. 19 and Alabama at No. 17.

Alabama is coming off an NCAA Tournament Elite Eight run, where it fell to No. 1-ranked Duke. Crimson Tide head coach Nate Oats lost four of his five starters from that team but reloaded with several transfers, including Jalil Bethea from Miami, Taylor Bol Bowen from Florida State and Noah Williamson from Bucknell.

Gonzaga and Alabama have met twice in the past three years in neutral-site matchups. Most recently, GU defeated the Tide 100-90 in Birmingham on Dec. 17, 2022, in a game where Drew Timme and Anton Watson combined for 46 points and Nolan Hickman added 13.

The year prior, Alabama traveled to Seattle’s Climate Pledge Arena and downed then-No. 3 Gonzaga 91-82 behind Jaden Shackelford’s 28 points.

Twenty-four hours later, Mark Few and the Zags will take on Maryland, which isn’t currently featured in many way-too-early Top 25 polls but is coming off an impressive Sweet 16 run. The Terrapins lost eight players to the transfer portal and two others to graduation, as well as head coach Kevin Willard. Former Texas A&M head coach Buzz Williams replaced Willard and brought several A&M players with him.

This matchup will mark the first between GU and Maryland in 17 years and the fifth ever. The two programs last met in 2008, when Gonzaga downed the Terps 81-59 at the Old Spice Classic in Orlando. Prior to that, Gonzaga earned an 88-76 win at the 2005 Maui Invitational and an 82-68 victory in Washington, D.C., in 2003. The first-ever meeting came in the 1995 NCAA Tournament, when Maryland beat GU 87-63 in Salt Lake City.

The 18-team field also includes several other projected preseason ranked teams, including Tennessee, Kansas, St. John’s, Iowa State, Houston, Oregon, Auburn and Michigan, as well as unranked programs such as Rutgers, Baylor, Creighton, Notre Dame, Syracuse, San Diego State and UNLV.

See the full two-day schedule linked in the tweet below:

Here is your 2025 Players Era Festival schedule, as first leaked by intrepid upcoming reporter @CoachDustyMay.https://t.co/u02PwIbA7w pic.twitter.com/nCKYeaU2bE

— Matt Norlander (@MattNorlander) July 1, 2025