Oftentimes – particularly in the high-major world – people dismiss the series of postseason events outside of the NCAA Tournament as unworthy of time or attention.
That’s decidedly not the case at Cleveland State.
“One of the hardest things to accomplish in college athletics is getting into the NCAA Tournament, especially in a mid-major program where it really all comes down to a few days in March,” Chris Kielsmeier said Monday, on his weekly radio show.
“So we’re very outspoken with our players that if that doesn’t go the way we want it to, you have a seat at the table somewhere else, and we’re putting ourselves in a position to have that opportunity.”
The Vikings’ 2021 championship at the now-defunct Women’s Basketball Invitational was something of a launching pad for the program’s recent run of success, as it began a streak of five consecutive postseason appearances, which most recently included last year’s WNIT Fab Four. Players like Laurel Rockwood and Izabella Zingaro have explicitly mentioned the opportunity to play in the postseason as a motivation behind transferring to CSU.
“They haven’t experienced the winning of Cleveland State, and I honestly haven’t experienced the true winning of Cleveland State either,” said Macey Fegan, who transferred in before the 2024-25 season. “Last year we had a good year, but it wasn’t to the level of getting to the NCAA Tournament or winning the conference tournament or the conference regular season.”
For a lot of this year, it appeared as if the aspirations of those players might be left wanting, particularly as the Vikings went 3-5 in their first eight games after the Christmas break.
“We’re different with all the 20-win seasons, and all the championships, and all the postseasons and stuff, but there’s no thing that says because we’ve been different in the past, and we’ve had all this success that this group is ever going to eventually figure it out to the level that we know they’re capable of,” Kielsmeier reflected.
The ship has since been righted, and Cleveland State, now 21-8 overall, has at least crept back into contention for a tournament invitation. As of Tuesday morning, the Vikings were ranked 151st in the NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) and 144th in Wins Above Bubble (WAB), two important metrics for evaluating postseason worthiness. Between the NCAA Tournament (which features a field of 68 teams), the WBIT (32), and the WNIT (48), 148 Division I teams receive postseason bids. Things like the NET and WAB are far from hard cutoffs though, particularly since high-major squads often decline bids to the “lower” events.
So CSU would appear to be in decent shape right now, though Kielsmeier isn’t so sure.
“I still feel like we’ve got work to do,” he said. “I don’t think we’ll get a bid where we’re at right now, but if we continue to have the level of play that we’ve had, which leads to success for us, we’ve got that opportunity. And for me, we didn’t come this far to be at this point. We came this far to go get more accomplished and I keep talking to them about the best is yet to come.”
Kielsmeier, an avid baseball fan, couldn’t resist an obvious comparison to his second-favorite sport.
“It’s kind of that baseball mentality, you always just want to be playing meaningful games in August and September,” he said. “Well, we’re playing meaningful games at the next level in February, and that’s what this program is used to.”
Skipping Sunday
In the more immediate sense, CSU’s stretch run impacts its seeding in the Horizon League tournament, which in turn impacts its chances of winning three playoff games and advancing to the NCAA Tournament.
Or is it four games?
An update to the HL tournament format will see five teams invited to Indianapolis for the final rounds of the championship this year, instead of the previous four. The rub is that the two lowest-seeded of those five teams will have to play each other on Sunday for the right to advance to the semifinals. The only way to guarantee an escape from that extra game is by finishing third or higher, and Cleveland State is acutely aware of the situation.
Specifically, if the Vikings win their final two games of the regular season, at Wright State on Wednesday, then at home against Oakland on Saturday, they will earn the third seed and a guaranteed escape from the play-in. That decidedly qualifies as an accomplishment, given what Kielsmeier called the most top-to-bottom parity that he’s ever seen in the conference.
“A top-three seed has been something that we’ve talked about all year,” he said. “With some of the games that we’ve played earlier in the year, it gave away control of that top three for a certain period of time, but we felt like if we won games that everything would take care of itself.”
It might run a bit contrary to the philosophies of other coaches, but Kielsmeier believes in communicating the realities of that ever-shifting chess board to his staff and team. Simply put, he wants everyone involved to understand what’s on the line every time they hit the floor.
“I don’t want to look back on it and they feel like they didn’t get something done because they didn’t understand the magnitude of what was at stake,” he said.
“We talked about it a few weeks ago, that our backs are against the wall for us to go accomplish the things that we really have set out to do. At some point there’s not going to continue to be hope and a chance, you’re going to have yourself so buried that a lot of the things…aren’t going to be options.”
The team, of course, responded well, reinforcing the decision to chat about the standings. Just as long as they’re not dwelling on them.
“We’ll talk about ’em one time, and then we’ll go to work on trying to play our best game of the year against Wright State, which will be needed to beat them because of how well they’re playing,” the coach added. “But it is a fun time of year because there’s so much at stake, and you’ve just got to embrace all that and enjoy the chase.”
QB1
Kielsmeier knew in advance that Fegan was going to have a big night in CSU’s win over IU Indianapolis last Thursday.
Why? Well, basically, because she looked mean.
“When she brings that focus and that kind of angry look to the game on game day, then I know it’s going to be an elite day for her, and it’s going to be an elite day for us,” he said.
Fegan, as has become the norm this season, lightly flirted with what would have been Cleveland State’s first triple-double since Shalonda Winton accomplished the feat twice within 22 days of December, 2012. The junior notched 12 points, 11 rebounds, and six assists against the Jaguars, her fifth double-double of the season.
All five have arrived through the scoring and rebounding columns, but don’t be surprised if Fegan puts up ten assists in one outing eventually. Offensively, she generally works out of the high post and, in most situations, her job is to get the ball down low to Zingaro, or out to the wing for a three-point attempt.
If Fegan makes the right read, followed by a crisp pass, and the shots are falling, a triple-double is hardly out of the question.
“You really do have to read it like a quarterback,” she said. “It’s got to be one option, two option and then three option.”
As with any quarterback, Fegan isn’t immune from criticism.
“Sometimes it’s frustrating to see you get the read wrong, and you’re running down the court and everybody’s like, ‘the corner was open, the corner was open.’” she related. “You’re like, ‘thanks guys, I know now, I just turned it over.’”
Ultimately though, she relishes her role, one that Kielsmeier calls “the heart of the team.” That label that may be just as accurate in an on-court Xs-and-Os sense as it is emotionally.
“Anybody who says they don’t want the ball in their hands is a liar, because that’s why you play,” Fegan said. “You want the ball in your hands. And to be able to make that read, and just be able to do it and have enough trust, my teammates have enough trust in me, it feels good.”
Unicorn Sighting
Fegan has developed a good bit of chemistry with Sarah Hurley, a three-point shooting wing who has undoubtedly let Fegan know that she was open on a play more than once.
The Canadian sophomore has quite an interesting stat line; in 46 games at Cleveland State, including as a regular starter this season, she has attempted exactly two free throws, and six two-point field goals. Meanwhile, Hurley has attempted 114 threes, 94 of them this season.
“We always joke, she’s shot like three layups in her college career in the two years,” Fegan said. “So it’s just fun to know she’s a three-point specialist, and that’s what she’s waiting to do.”
The third of those layup attempts came midway through the first quarter of that IU Indy win. Hurley intercepted a pass intended for the Jaguars’ Hailey Smith and sprinted down the court with the ball, before trying to score.
Smith, however, recovered in time to break up the shot attempt.
“[Hurley] took off, got a fast break, steal, they ended up swiping it away, hitting it out bounds towards when she was shooting the layup,” Fegan remembered. “But we were joking, we’re like, ‘Sarah, another layup for you!’”
With five two-point attempts in 496 minutes this season, and if current averages hold, Hurley should get a chance at redemption five contests from now. That could very well end up being the Horizon League championship game.
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