There are variants to one of Chris Kielsmeier’s favorite repeated lines, but a basic construction of it goes “you’re only guaranteed two things in basketball: a beginning and an ending.”
For the 2024-25 Cleveland State women’s basketball team, the ending came on a rainy, windy Wednesday night at Buffalo, in front of 3,088 blue-clad Bulls supporters at the WNIT’s Fab 4 semifinals, by a 74-69 count.
CSU boasted several bright spots in defeat, none more luminescent than Sara Guerreiro, who met her own personal ending with a monstrous 18 points, 14 rebounds and seven assists. Whether it was pointing up at a jeering UB pep band after hitting a desperate three-pointer against an expiring shot clock in the first quarter, burying a step-back jumper over Buffalo defender Paula Lopez, or outworking two Bulls for a rebound and drawing a shooting foul, the mechanical engineering graduate was everywhere and everything.
Destiny Leo played each minute of the Vikings’ four WNIT games, except for the couple that she needed to recover from a third-quarter collision while attempting to draw a charge. Both before and after the incident, Leo was well in form, connecting on four of her six three-point attempts and scoring 14 points.
There was also a spectacular and-one bucket by Mickayla Perdue with 5:18 to go, an out-of-control, falling-over flip through the hoop, followed by a made free throw, to give Cleveland State its final lead of the night, 63-62.
But then, there were the turnovers. The Vikings coughed up possession 21 times in all, a poisonous number for any team seeking a win in a game where neither side managed much separation otherwise. Four of the turnovers came after Perdue’s three-point effort, combining with a 1-for-4 field goal line down the stretch to help Buffalo score 12 of the game’s final 18 points. That was enough daylight for UB to advance to Saturday’s title game against Troy.
Interviewers and interviewees, particularly in the sports world, are often mocked for their propensity to lean on cliches and for their repetitive questions and answers, which can be a fair criticism. At the same time and within the constraints of 1,000 words and strategic preferences, there are only so many ways a basketball game can play out. And there is only so much new ground to cover over the course of the 37 games, 27 ending in victory, that Cleveland State played this year.
Furthermore, Kielsmeier can be a bit impatient with inquisitors after losses, making it imperative to load up three or four good questions (in descending quality order), and be prepared to end the media session at any point.
Safe to say that the turnovers cost you the game?
“They beat us the way we knew they could, and we allowed it to happen.”
How much were you affected by the quick turnaround, after winning a Great 8 game at Purdue Fort Wayne on Monday night, then needing to almost immediately travel up here, while Buffalo was waiting at home after beating Rutgers on Sunday?
“It is what it is, and you’ve got a reason to play, so find a way to get it done.”
What about Guerreiro’s effort?
“I probably should’ve gotten her the ball more, because she was making plays all over the place.”
With the transfer portal open and your season now over, how busy do you expect to be over the next couple weeks?
“[Coaches] are a product of ourselves, we can’t get out of our own way. We’re going to work as hard as we can, and hopefully get enough sleep to not fall over the next day.”
Devoid of his usual post-defeat frustration, Kielsmeier indulged those sorts of questions for a few minutes, but it was clear that his mind was elsewhere.
More than anything else, the coach, sounding a bit weary from a quarter century of the perpetual grind of leading college basketball programs, just wanted to speak from the heart for a while. Not about the ending with CSU’s Team 52, but about the beginning and the middle.
“There were moments where this journey was really hard for me, and they pulled me out of that,” Kielsmeier said. “They were amazing to coach. They were so connected, and it was one of the smoothest years of my coaching career. It was just coaching, and not having to deal with stuff.”
“There are so many struggles in college athletics right now, that’s an old school team right there. They came together and said they were going to do it because I love the game, I’m going to do it for each other, and I’m going to do it for my coaches.”
This season’s Vikings, it needs to be said, fell short on a few fronts. Upset losses to the likes of Oakland and Northern Kentucky deflated the team’s Horizon League regular season title defense well before the close of the schedule. Cleveland State was unable to defeat Green Bay at least once for the first time since 2019-20, and an ugly loss to Purdue Fort Wayne in the HL semifinals ended CSU’s March Madness dreams.
However, the team regrouped for a spirited WNIT run that came within 45 minutes of the second postseason championship in program history, including dramatic finishes against Coppin State and Duquesne then, most significantly, a revenge road victory over the Mastodons.
On Wednesday night, none of that seemed to matter a ton to Kielsmeier, as he considered his final moments with this season’s squad and the idea of scouring the ever-beckoning transfer portal to begin the cycle all over again.
“There’s so much about me, me, me, me,” he said. “And that group was about us. That group was about how can I help you. And they lived it. That’s how they live their lives. That just shows their character and who they are as people. You just don’t find that very often right now. That’s that group, and that’s their legacy forever.”
“You’ll never take that away from them, and to me, that’s so much bigger than wins and losses.”
