What a turnaround this has been from a few seasons ago for the Omaha Mavericks. During the 2021-2022 season Omaha Men’s Basketball only won a total of five games which led to the firing of Coach Derrin Hansen who served as the head coach since 2005. During that offseason Omaha Mavericks Athletic Director Adrian Dowell found an excellent head coach Chris Crutchfield to be the head coach of Omaha Men’s Basketball. During the 2022-2023 season, it was basically like starting all over with the basketball program and Omaha ended up only winning a total of nine games and finished dead least in conference play. Improvement showed during the 2023-2024 season where Omaha won a total of 15 games, finished sixth in the Summit League and made it to the conference semifinals. At the beginning of the season, Omaha was predicted to finish in eighth place out of a total of nine teams due to players leaving the team and entering the transfer portal. My prediction was Omaha finishing in fourth place which was higher than most people, nut this team really exceeded my expectations too.
One reason this program was successful this season was keeping a few of the core players from the beginning of the Chris Crutchfield era JJ White, Marquel Sutton, Tony Osburn, and Ja’Sean Glover. Assistant Coach Kyan Brown who used to be an assistant at North Dakota State used the transfer portal and snagged Josh Streit and Lance Waddles who were key players off the bench this season for Omaha. Other players who came to Omaha via the transfer portal were Issac Ondekane from Lindenwood and Kam Thomas from Hutchinson Community College. Another huge reason with Omaha being successful is staying healthy and only a few players had to miss games this season due to illness or minor injuries.
By now we have probably have all seen the trash can post game celebrations after an Omaha victory this season. It all started against Cal Poly with Coach Kyan Brown frustrated with the non conference play with an overall 4-9 record at the time. Since then Omaha’s record has been 15-3. Since my last article from the six game winning streak one, Omaha cruised in Denver and defeated St Thomas at home and finally winning a game in Tulsa at Oral Roberts to be on top the Summit League Standings. The winning streak came to an end however in Vermillion when Omaha lost to South Dakota 91-87. Omaha at one point in that game was up by 15 with 15 minutes to go in the game only for South Dakota to get red hot in the second half. Omaha rebounded nicely winning the next three games all at home to Denver, North Dakota, and North Dakota State. During the Denver game, the trash can celebration was popular, fans could bring their own small trash can and receive cheap popcorn. The North Dakota game was a very back and forth game which ended in a JJ White game winning buzzer beater three pointer which was the highlight to start out SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt, a SportsCenter Top 10 play, and Twitter accounts going viral due to the trash can celebrations such as the Sickos Committee and Mid Major Madness.
The next two games Omaha struggled defensively losing to the other top Summit League teams. Omaha could not contain Oscar Cluff against South Dakota State and lost 98-85. In the game against St Thomas, JJ White suffered a thigh injury and missed most of the game as a result and Omaha lost to St Thomas 95-84. Omaha got back to the winning column against Kansas City winning 78-66. The game against South Dakota featured the AEW tag team guys and a record non kids day attendance at Baxter Arena for Omaha Men’s Basketball. Omaha at one point was up by 21 points before a huge South Dakota comeback but Omaha held on to win by a score of 93-85. In the game against Oral Roberts, Omaha was only up by four points with 16 minutes to go before going on a 31-12 run to end the game including a 21-0 run holding Oral Roberts scoreless for over eight minutes.
Omaha gets the #1 seed in the Summit League Tournament and their opponent will be the winner of the #9/#8 seed matchup between Oral Roberts vs Kansas City on Thursday at 6pm. St Thomas is the #2 seed and if St Thomas ends up winning the Summit League Conference Tournament, Omaha will get the auto bid to NCAA March Madness with St Thomas being ineligible due to transitioning into DI. The odds for Omaha making it to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament can not be even higher than this and see what transpires in Sioux Falls later this week and this weekend.