After thinking their basketball season was still alive, the University of South Alabama Jaguars' season has come to an abrupt end.
On Sunday night, the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) extended an offer to the Jaguars to play in its postseason tournament.
An hour later, they were called and informed that their offer had been revoked. The reason it was rescinded is that another team, UC Riverside, had already been offered to play in the NIT but had already accepted an invite to the lesser College Basketball Invitation and was able to get out of it.
On Monday, NIT posted an apology for the mishap.
“After the NIT bracket was released Sunday evening, it was brought to the NIT’s attention that one of the teams scheduled to participate in the tournament had also committed to a non-NCAA affiliated postseason event," NIT wrote. "In an effort to secure another participating team, the NIT prematurely extended an invitation to the South Alabama Jaguars, prior to learning that the original team chose to accept its invitation to the NIT. Regrettably, the NIT rescinded its invitation to South Alabama. We understand the emotional impact this confusion created, and we sincerely apologize to South Alabama, Head Coach Richie Riley, and all the student-athletes for the error.”
South Alabama head coach Richie Riley blasted the NIT's "meaningless apology" and said what happened to his players, who had already been told their season wasn't over yet, was "inexcusable."
"A meaningless apology to the most meaningful group of players I’ve ever coached! What they did to us last night is inexcusable! These guys in our locker room don’t deserve this and it’s sad your idea of making it right is a copy and paste apology!" he wrote on X.
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