Memphis basketball coach Penny Hardaway spoke with a small group of reporters ahead of the Bluff City Golf Classic hosted by Bluff City Collective at TPC Southwind Monday afternoon.
Hardaway’s club, though it’s largely been together since June, held its first official practice of the 2024-25 season Monday morning. Hardaway, who will coach his seventh campaign at Memphis this year, feels the Tigers are primed as ever for next month’s exhibitions against North Carolina and Alabama and a daunting non-conference schedule that includes matchups with defending national champion UConn, Virginia, Clemson, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Missouri, UNLV and others. Memphis will also face two of UNC, Auburn, Michigan State, Colorado, Iowa State and Dayton on top of UConn in the Maui Invitational.
“They’re ready. I know the city is gonna love this team. This is a team that’s tough, and kinda carries that mentality we’ve always had here in Memphis with the grit-and-grind” Hardaway said. “I’m really anxious for the city to see these young men.”
Hardaway put together a robust transfer portal class this offseason featuring star players like Texas guard Tyrese Hunter, Tulsa guard PJ Haggerty, Wichita State guard Colby Rogers and Illinois forward Dain Dainja. The Tigers also added solid depth pieces in SMU forward Tyreek Smith, UTSA wing PJ Carter, George Mason guard Baraka Okojie and Ole Miss center Moussa Cisse, who played his freshman season at Memphis in 2020-21.
Hardaway says that Hunter and Cisse have emerged as Memphis’ leaders thus far.
“In Moussa’s last year here, [he’s] wanting to do it at a high level coming back to Memphis. Tyrese is just a natural-born leader. Not that no one else is saying anything, but those two guys are definitely standing out.”
Hunter, a 6-foot senior who averaged 11.1 points and 4.1 assists last year, dealt with a bat of tragedy last month when his aunt passed away. This unfortunately isn’t a new feeling for Hunter, whose parents both died before he turned 14. He also lost his grandmother, who helped raise him after his parent’s death, in April 2023.
But Hunter’s focus and tenacity, according to Hardaway, hasn’t wavered.
“You can never put that into words. Basketball is what it is, but your family and your life outside of that is a lifetime,” Hardaway said. “We supported him, and he’s come back from that feeling focused and locked in. Doesn’t look like he missed a beat.”
Okojie, a 6-foot-3 sophomore, has been sidelined from team activities since late June after undergoing shoulder surgery. Hardaway told CBS Sports’ Jon Rothstein last week that Okojie is hoping to be cleared ahead of Memphis’ exhibition play, but that may be out of the question now.
“I doubt it. Don’t charge me for that. I’m just looking at him now, but he hasn’t really gone through a full-contact practice yet,” Hardaway says. “I think he’ll be ready for the first [regular season] game.”
Hardaway will surely need as many hands on deck as possible for the first two months of the season. He’s consistently scheduled high-level, non-conference opponents throughout his tenure, but this year’s gauntlet may be the toughest one yet.
Eight of Memphis’ scheduled or potential opponents are top-50 teams on barttovik.com—Iowa State (No. 3), North Carolina (No. 6), Auburn (No. 7), UConn (No. 12), Michigan State (No. 17), Mississippi State (No. 22), Ole Miss (No. 39) and Clemson (No. 46). But the Tigers—ranked No. 32—still want “all the smoke,” even if Hardaway isn’t as bashful about it as he used to be.
“I think got in trouble when I first got here saying, ‘We want all the smoke.’ That was basically for recruitment because of the young kids, but we weren’t afraid to play anyone. So, [for] anyone who got that misconstrued, it was definitely all on respect of, ‘We’re not afraid to play.’ Whether we feel like we’re ready or not, we wanna play because we wanna see where we are,” Hardaway said.
Memphis tips off its regular season against Missouri on Nov. 4 inside FedExForum.