Katie Reid

Thirteen years ago, the Oakland men’s basketball team made it to the NCAA Tournament. Head coach Greg Kampe was in his 28th season as the head man of the Golden Grizzlies, and the team was led by Keith Benson and Larry Wright.

Nothing was significant about that season other than the fact that it was the last time the Golden Grizzlies made it to the NCAA Tournament.

Although 13 years may not seem like such a long time, things have changed drastically since the last time Kampe took a team to the Big Dance.

Oakland was the regular season and conference tournament champions of the Summit League — which OU isn’t a part of anymore — the last time it was featured in the NCAA Tournament. The league consisted of teams such as North and South Dakota State, Southern Utah, Centenary and Oral Roberts, a team that just recently made NCAA Tournament history.

Anyone with any smidgen of knowledge surrounding Oakland basketball and the now-Horizon League would be able to identify that the previous paragraph doesn’t even come remotely close to describing the current state of Oakland basketball in 2023-24.

North and South Dakota State, Southern Utah, Centenary and Oral Roberts almost never appear on Oakland’s schedule nowadays, and the Golden Grizzlies’ road trips are now more efficiently limited to just the midwest region.

Rather than making mid-season trips to the Dakotas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Louisiana and Utah — Kampe and his team got the full United States tour back in the day — Oakland remains in the comfy confines of no farther west than Wisconsin, no farther east than Pennsylvania and no farther south than Kentucky for its home games.

Of course, this isn’t a history lesson on the adventures of the 2010-11 Golden Grizzlies.

Rather, the historical context serves as an indicator of just how much the sport has changed since the last time Oakland was playing for a national title 13 years ago.

Guard Reggie Hamilton was eligible to play for the 2010-11 season after sitting out the 2009-10 season due to rules that no longer exist in today’s game.

Thirteen years may not seem like a long time between NCAA Tournament appearances for a mid-major program, but now in its 11th year in the Horizon League, the time is now for Oakland.

Since Oakland joined the Horizon League just before the 2013-14 season, six teams have won the conference tournament and gone on to the NCAA Tournament. None of those six teams were Oakland.

Northern Kentucky, Wright State, Cleveland State, Green Bay, Milwaukee and Valparaiso — a team that isn’t even in the league anymore, again, showing how much things have changed — have all won a conference tournament title in that time frame.

Meanwhile, Oakland has been constantly treading water with its head just barely above the surface.

But this year seems different.

The Golden Grizzlies have won nine of their last 10 games dating back to New Year’s Eve. They sit in a tie atop the league standings with a solid 10-3 conference record.

What’s ironic about the team winning nine of its last 10 games dating back to Dec. 31 is that the 2010-11 team had won 18 of its last 19 games heading into the NCAA Tournament before losing to No. 4 seed Texas in the opening round.

Now, will this year’s Oakland team go on to run the table and put together a lengthy win streak like the team did in 2010-11? Probably not.

Although the upcoming schedule is favorable, the Horizon League is much more balanced than the Summit League was 13 years ago.

If Oakland does manage to defy the odds and win out, it will have won the conference tournament and be on its way to the Big Dance, having won 19 of its last 20 games.

Again, it’s unlikely, but nothing is impossible.

But this needs to be the year Oakland finally breaks through and makes it to the NCAA Tournament. Guards Rocket Watts, Blake Lampman and Jack Gohlke will all be taking the next step in their respective basketball journeys after this season, and senior Trey Townsend will have to decide if he wants to return for his fifth and final year of eligibility.

This isn’t to say an NCAA Tournament appearance in the near future would be impossible, but losing three or four key components during the offseason could put the Golden Grizzlies back in a rebuilding phase.

Oakland has the pieces to do this. It’s clearly established itself as one of the best three teams in the conference, and it’s healthy and playing great basketball when it matters most.

As it unfortunately goes in the mid-major conferences, the body of work put together in the regular season is largely moot by the time March rolls around. Sure, regular-season records play into seeding for the league tournament, but after the seeds are given, all bets are off.

Detroit Mercy, which is 0-24 this season, could catch fire late into the year and roll into the conference tournament as the No. 11 seed and win the whole thing. Now, the odds of all OU professors canceling classes for the rest of the semester are higher than the odds of Detroit Mercy winning the conference tournament, but the possibility is there.

But this is it for Kampe and Oakland.

Oakland is likely headed for a top-three seed in the league tournament, which means it will need to win three games to go dancing.

Win a home game against a middle-of-the-pack team. 

Go to Indianapolis as one of the four best teams in the league.

Win two games there, and you’re going dancing for the first time since 2011.

It can happen, and with this team, it needs to happen.