NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Shouldn’t there have more frustration? Shouldn’t there have been more disappointment? Shouldn’t there have been moretears?
The Ohio men’s basketball team had just exploded back from a 20-point deficit against the No. 4 seed Florida Gators in the first round of the NCAA Tournament and they seemed … well, they didn’t seem happy, but nobody was grabbing for Kleenex.
Ohio coach Tim O’Shea, whose future in Athens is secure for another five years after his contract was extended Thursday through the 2009-10 season, certainly didn’t shed a tear after his team almost scared the Gators into another early-round exit. During the post-game press conference, he held up his head and addressed questions with honest answers. He was everything a leader should be.
“I told the team it may hurt now,” he said. “But when you have a chance to reflect on the season you’ve just completed, you’re going to be proud.
“The way they played today will leave a lot of people very proud of Ohio’s teams.” Indeed, the way the Bobcats have played during the past season will leave a lot of people very proud of the Bobcats, especially O’Shea’s Bobcats.
They finished with 21 wins, the most for an Ohio men’s basketball team since 1994-95, — when Gary Trent and Geno Ford were still prowling The Convo — which is a stark contrast to the 10-20 record they put up just last year.
They almost won the Mid-American Conference East Division championship and a No. 1 seed for the MAC Tournament on the last day of the regular season but fell short at Kent State. That the Bobcats were even in such a position, though, is a testament to the team that was picked to finish last in the division.
And they won the MAC Tournament as the No. 4 seed, the lowest-seeded team to win the tourney since it expanded to 13 teams six years ago.
“We just never gave up.” Forward Sonny Troutman said those words after Ohio’s 67-62 loss today in the Gaylord Entertainment Center but they might as well have been said about the whole season.
When the Bobcats were down this season, they just kept their heads up.
Maybe that’s because of their coach, who was underappreciated while playing at Boston College during the early 1980s and while coaching at Ohio for the last four years — until last Saturday, that is.
Or maybe it’s because of its leading scorer, Mychal Green, who wasn’t even recruited for basketball out of high school — he earned an academic scholarship to Louisville — went to California on a whim to play junior basketball and wound up 11th in the MAC in scoring this season.
Or maybe it’s because of its often-quiet force in the middle, Leon Williams, who has already drawn comparisons to Brandon Hunter and might soon be talked about in the same breath as Trent. But, oh, the travails he went through, academically and geographically, just to play basketball Or maybe, just maybe, it’s because of the man on the end of the bench, Kevin Kuwik, the Army Captain who showed up unannounced for the first round of the MAC Tournament on two weeks of military leave, who traveled more than 8,000 miles from Mosul, Iraq, to Athens just to follow the team he loves. He’s going to be redeployed on Tuesday as the happiest Captain in the Army.
There were so many great stories swirling about the Bobcats this season, so many reasons to be happy about the last four months — and so many more to be excited about the next 12 — that, really, there shouldn’t have been any frustration or disappointment or tears.
This team achieved so much when so many doubted it that the only fitting ending was smiles.
And while flashing one of the biggest of the day, O’Shea stepped down from the press conference podium with a parting comment for anyone listening.
“Hope to see you back here next year.” In the uncertain world of college basketball and NCAA Tournament berths, nothing is ever for sure, but a lot of people sure would like to see O’Shea and the Bobcats back next year, too.
17 Archives
Matt LaWell
