“We just saved our season.”
That was Greg Kampe during his on-court postgame interview, and he might be right.
Down 77-74 with 26 seconds to play, the feeling in Orena was grim. Detroit Mercy came to play, and the Golden Grizzlies were staring down a third straight home loss, and effectively the end of their hopes of a first round bye.
Then, Isaiah Jones came up with a steal. He pushed the pace and played some back and forth with DQ Cole, who tied to the game in the closing seconds of regulation.
“Give Isaiah Jones all the credit in the world for us winning that game,” Kampe said.
Jones was a +22 in the 93-83 victory, and he only sat four minutes of action. He buried a three in overtime that served as the de facto dagger as well. He finished with seven points and seven rebounds, while only taking two shots.
Isaiah Jones led this story, but he was hardly the only contributor. Five Golden Grizzlies scored in double figures.
Nassim Mashhour continued his second half breakout with 24 points and four rebounds. He is starting to not only look like a factor for this years team, but a building block for the future. Jaylen Jones also posted his high point total in an Oakland uniform with 16 points. The two guards were exactly what Oakland needed in this one.
A big story in the game, and how those two got their points was the free throw line. Oakland tied a school record with 39 free throw makes, and had 52 attempts. Mashhour was 13-16, while Jones was 10-11. Late game fouls and a couple of technical fouls aided those totals, but it was still an extremely physical game.
“I’m not the most athletic player,” Mashhour said. “I have to be crafty around the rim, so I always work on playing off of two feet.”
Oakland’s big man duo felt that physicality too. Allen Mukeba and Buru Naivalurua were both limited with fouls, as each ended the game with four. Mukeba was only limited to six shot attempts, but shot 14 free throws as well. He made only 7-14 from the line, but made three huge buckets to find his way to 13 points and 10 rebounds. Naivalurua went 5-10 from the floor, and posted 11 points.
DQ Cole made 10 points, but three of them were the biggest of the game.
“I knew it was good the second it left my hand,” Cole said of the game extending shot.
The energy that both sides brought felt a little different than a normal game, and Kampe felt the same way.
“What we witnessed today was the rebirth of the rivalry,” Kampe said in his postgame presser, after acknowledging the uptick in intensity in the first matchup between the Golden Grizzlies and Titans last month.
Oakland moved to 12-15 overall with the win, and is sitting at 9-7 in the Horizon League. They are 1.5 games back of Purdue Fort Wayne for the final first round bye, and 2 games back of Milwaukee for the coveted fourth spot. Oakland will play both of those teams in the final four contests and it starts in Fort Wayne on Friday.
Friday’s huge game will start at 7pm Eastern Time, and will be broadcast on ESPN+.
