The Mercyhurst men’s and women’s basketball teams will be hosting the 2nd annual Mac Madness on Thursday, Oct. 30, at 9 p.m. This event will be held in the Mercyhurst Athletic Center and is open for everyone to attend.

“It’s just a way to get the school excited about the upcoming season and to introduce the school to the players,” senior Terrence Ingram said.

“It’s a big thing in college basketball on the D1 level and I thought it would be good to do it here.”

Players from the basketball teams will be dressed up in costumes and will scrimmage against each other. Fans attending can also wear Halloween costumes, since it is the day before Halloween, and participate in a costume contest.

During the event, fans will be able to go on the court and interact with the team and other fans, plus compete in contests to win prizes. There will be five events that fans can participate in. Also, free pizza will be offered and t-shirts will be given away.

“We are going to be giving out a lot of free gift cards and other incentives from Erie businesses,” Ingram said. “We are still getting some in, so it might be more than gift cards this year.”

Ingram put together this event last year and he said it was a “pretty good turnout of a few hundred people.” However, he is hoping that this year, the event will be even bigger.

“Every year we want it to get bigger and bigger to the point where we get people from the community to start coming and getting involved,” Ingram said.

“This year we want to get a thousand fans, that’s our goal. We feel that with the right promotion, we can do it.”