'Dream come true': Oakland returns to NCAA Tournament for first time since 2011
Tony PaulIndianapolis — Oakland's waited a long time for this moment.
And when the final seconds ticked off the clock, Trey Townsend clutching the ball and his teammates starting to dance around him, it was even sweeter than Oakland coach Greg Kampe remembered.
Kampe's known for his talking, not so much for his crying. But he was in tears late Tuesday night, as his Golden Grizzlies earned a trip back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2011.
Oakland beat Milwaukee, 83-76 in a thrilling street fight of a Horizon League championship game before a small but raucous crowd that was decidedly pro-Oakland at Indiana Farmers Coliseum. Oakland will learn its NCAA Tournament opponent and destination on Selection Sunday.
"My whole focus for the whole year was to get here and get these kids here," Kampe said as the celebration continued at center court behind him, his players wasting little time to change into their championship T-shirts and hats. "I haven't been to sleep since we got here. I've probably gone through 12 5-Hour Energies, maybe I'm a little bit jacked up on caffeine right now because of that. But it just hit me. When the confetti came down, it hit me, man.
"I just can't tell you," Kampe continued, as he began to choke up, "how happy I am."
Townsend, the Horizon League player or the year who grew up attending Kampe's camps and only ever wanting to be an Oakland Golden Grizzly, had the best game of a career full of great games, with a career-best 38 points, including 27 in the second half, to go with 11 rebounds.
He flat-out put the team on his back in the second half, when his teammates needed him the most.
Townsend scored 27 of Oakland's final 40 points, perhaps no shot bigger than a bucket-and-one with 4 minutes, 43 seconds left. The basket, set up on the other end by a block strip by senior guard Blake Lampman, turned a one-point Oakland deficit into a 65-64 lead.
Townsend let out a roaring scream when the ball went in, bringing the bench to its feet. He then made the free throw to make it 66-64.
A bucket by Milwaukee's Kentrell Pullian, a junior guard from Benton Harbor, Michigan, on the other end tied things up at 66, but Townsend answered right back with a floater to make it 68-66, taking advantage as the Panthers were forced to drop into single-coverage for much of the second half.
Milwaukee junior swingman B.J. Freeman made a 3 from the corner, the ball bouncing high off the rim and in, to tie it at 70 with 2:56 left, but there was Townsend again, with an answer, on a jump hook to make it 72-70. He then had a steal on the other end, came down, put up a missed shot, got his own rebound and put up another — and Milwaukee was called for goaltending. That made it 74-70 with 2 minutes left.
When Townsend finally did miss a bucket, there was fellow senior forward Chris Conway, with the putback to make it 76-72 with 1:23 left, and it was, in an Oakland season jam-packed with tension, finally, smooth sailing from there.
Freeman missed a 3, junior guard DQ Cole came down with the rebound, and the fouling game was on.
Townsend got a block on the last defensive possession, scooping up the ball, getting it across midcourt and cradling it as his teammates, the Oakland bench and crowd began to celebrate the program's first Horizon League championship. Oakland joined the Horizon League in 2014.
In the second half, Townsend made amends for a first half in which he was visibly frustrated by a lack of foul calls.
"If it ain't broke, don't fix it," Townsend said, a piece of the cut-down nets draped around his neck, after his monster night, aided by some foul trouble for Milwaukee big man Faizon Fields, who eventually fouled out.
"I just kept going to what was working, and it worked out. It just happened to be my day today. It feels amazing."
Oakland (23-11) won the Horizon League regular-season championship for the first time, but the goal all along was to get to the NCAA Tournament. Kampe frankly said anything less, given this roster and all the key seniors, and the season would likely be considered a "failure."
The NCAA Tournament was the goal from Day 1 even after Oakland, in the preseason poll, was picked to finish sixth, and even after it lost an exhibition game to Division II Walsh. It didn't take long into the season, as Oakland went toe-to-toe with several Big Ten powerhouses and then won at Xavier, that it was clear the preseason takes were off.
Oakland is heading to the Division I NCAA Tournament for the fourth time (2005, 2010, 2011) in 20 years, after a series of Horizon League tournament thrillers, over Purdue Fort Wayne, Cleveland State and Milwaukee.
Oakland beat Milwaukee (20-15) for the third time this season, and all three games were super tight, including a double-overtime game in late January. This game saw nine ties and 10 lead changes.
"You look at who we beat," said Lampman, who had 12 points, five rebounds, four blocks and two steals. "We're resilient. Resilient. Then we gave it to our guy, Trey T. He was unbelievable."
Townsend was named tournament MVP, and was serenaded with "M-V-P" chants from teammates as he cut down his own piece of the net, his parents, former Oakland basketball players Skip and Nicole looking on and smiling.
Senior guard Jack Gohlke, who also made the all-tournament team, added 15 points, all on 3's, and two steals for Oakland, as the Pewaukee, Wisconsin, native posted another big game against his hometown school. He scored 27 in the double-OT win in Milwaukee in late January, in what proved a turning point for his career arc.
Conway added 11 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks — continuing to play a huge presence on defense throughout the Horizon League tournament. Cole had seven assists.
For Milwaukee, which had won six games in a row entering the final, redshirt junior guard Erik Pratt had 16 points, Pulian had 15 and Freeman had 14. The Panthers were 4-for-19 (21.1%) on 3-pointers.
Oakland, which led, 37-33, at halftime and then had to weather six fouls being called against the Golden Grizzlies in the first two minutes of the second half, becomes the first mid-major team from Michigan to make the men's NCAA Tournament since Western Michigan in 2014. It's the first team from Michigan to clinch a berth this year; Michigan State is likely to join Oakland on Sunday. Oakland figures to be given a 13 or 14 seed.
"Dream come true," said Gohlke, the transfer from Hillsdale who played in the Division II NCAA Tournament. "That's what you play the game for."
The Horizon League has been a source of many headaches over the years for Oakland, including for this senior class, which lost to Cleveland State in the 2021 championship game, and was hampered by key late-season injuries the last two seasons. But on Tuesday night, the demons finally were exorcised, despite Oakland playing short-handed again, without senior guard Rocket Watts and sophomore forward Isaiah Jones, both out with ankle injuries.
Watts, who played in the NCAA Tournament for Michigan State in 2021, still was right there in the middle of the celebration Tuesday night, holding the Horizon League championship trophy. His huge game in the quarterfinal victory over Purdue Fort Wayne — the game in which he got hurt, late — got Oakland to this point.
Also in the thick of the center-court celebration was Oakland athletic director Steve Waterfield and president Ora Hirsch Pescovitz, who humorously took pleas from students who made the 4-hour trip to Indy — the university bussed in about 50 of them for the championship game — to cancel classes on Wednesday.
"If you could've been on the stage and seen the tears on these kids' faces and how happy they are, they just love each other," said Kampe, shaking as he spoke about one of the crowning achievements in his 40 years at Oakland.
"You have no clue how hard it is to do what we just did. We went about our business, and look where we are.
"I'm speechless, and you know for me to be speechless, that's special."
@tonypaul1984