Wichita State fell just four points short of advancing to the national championship game in last season’s men’s basketball NCAA Tournament.
The Shockers’ offense was run by senior guard Malcolm Armstead and freshman guard Fred VanVleet. However, Ohio junior quarterback Derrius Vick was almost a member of that Final Four team.
Vick, a native of Lincoln, Neb., was waiting on two offers to lace up on the hardwood in college — those coming from Wichita State and Creighton. Fortunately for Ohio football, those offers never came and the Bobcats snagged Vick, who’s in the midst of battling for a starting quarterback position next season.
“My vision was to play basketball,” he said. “That’s the only thing I did in high school when it came to practice. When it came to football practice I picked it up day one of football camp and put it down as soon as we were done with the season.”
Throughout his career at Lincoln Southeast High School, Vick was a standout point guard and earned All-Nebraska honors in his junior season for the Knights.
Creighton and Wichita State entered the NCAA Tournament again this year, but were each upset last weekend.
The Shockers went an unprecedented 34-0 heading into the NCAA tournament before losing to Kentucky on Sunday in the round of 32 teams. The Blue Jays were a No. 3 seed and were led by All-American Doug McDermott, but also lost in the third round to the sixth-seeded Baylor Bears.
Despite not receiving offers from his dream schools, Vick garnered attention from other Division I programs. He received offers from North Dakota State, South Dakota State and Colorado State. The former two schools combined to win the past three Summit League titles, advancing them to the NCAA Tournament.
“Every time I watch basketball and one of my friends sees one of those two teams, one of my friends says ‘you could have been playing,’” Vick said. “I just kind of smile. It’s in the past, and now I can’t even shoot a layup anymore.”
And though he’s decided to stick with football and has begun spring practices, the NCAA Tournament will resume this weekend and Vick’s bracket would already be busted, if he was allowed to fill one out.
“I’m a big Kansas and North Carolina fan. I like Roy Williams and both of those teams,” he said. “I’m from Nebraska, so they finally made the tournament for the first time in sixteen years. I was hoping they could get a first round victory but that didn’t happen. Creighton is also in Nebraska and they laid an egg too. This whole March Madness is just madness.”
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