It had been 14 years since the men’s basketball team won a conference tournament and five years since their last winning season. With a first-year head coach and a roster with only seven players, few people expected much out of Wright State in 2007.
But 2007 became one of the most memorable seasons in WSU history when the Raiders Butler 60-55 on ESPN for a trip to the NCAA tournament.
“You could just tell that night was going to be special,” then Associate Head Coach Billy Donlon said.
A sold out Nutter Center crowd of 10,686—the third biggest in school history—packed the arena for the Horizon League championship game. Extra bleachers were added at the open end of the arena to accommodate fans, who were adorned with green and gold.
“I’ve never experienced anything remotely close to that and I’ve been to some big, crazy games,” former WSU student Jeff Baltes said. “Every person in that arena was on their feet the whole game. I couldn’t hear the guy next to me.”
With the Nutter Center rocking, confidence was high for the Raiders, who beat Butler at home earlier in the season before another sold-out crowd.
“We knew we had beaten them before and we could do it again,” then freshman Todd Brown said. “We were at home and it was for the championship, so anything could happen.”
Donlon attributed the team’s attitude and confidence to having a short memory. Earlier in the season, WSU was blown out by 39 points on the road at Bradley and by 31 points at Butler.
“We got humbled a few times during the season,” Donlon said. “The pounding we took was so great the team had a real determination and a great inner belief.”
Head Coach Brad Brownell’s pregame message was simple: enjoy the game and have fun because the NCAA tournament is only 40 minutes away.
The game started off about as poorly as possible for WSU when Butler jumped out to a quick 10-0 lead, but the Raiders never panicked and remained close with the Bulldogs the rest of the game.
“In that situation, when you’re down 10-0, 99 out of 100 coaches would call timeout. But Brad (Brownell) didn’t,” Donlon said.
The Raiders eventually clawed their way back into the game and Butler called a timeout, prompting Brownell to tell his players how much faith he had in them.
“He (Brownell) told them ‘I have belief in you. I didn’t need to call a timeout,’” Donlon said.
The game remained neck-and-neck with neither team getting more than an eight point lead. Senior DaShaun Wood led the Raiders with 27 points, and hit the go-ahead three-pointer with 1:06 to go.
“As good as DaShaun was that night, he probably had the best single season of any player in Horizon League history,” Donlon said. “He was not losing that game.”
After both teams traded free throws, sophomore Will Graham went to the line for a chance to ice the game and send the Raiders to the NCAA tournament.
Graham’s free throws were so perfect they never even hit the rim.
“Those were the two biggest free throws in WSU history,” Donlon said.
As time expired, thousands of WSU students and fans stormed the court in celebration, hugging, cheering and crying tears of joy after a program-defining win.
“I have watched games on TV when students storm the court and how crazy it looks, but being in the complete middle of it is just insane,” former player Reinaldo Smith said. “I remember players coming back to the locker room at different times because we were stuck in the middle of it all. We didn’t want that moment to end.”
“It was insane,” Baltes said. “It was a swarm. One second I was holding people back on the baseline, and the next I looked up to see that I was on the other side of the scoreboard.”
The emotions of that game are still present throughout the Nutter Center, and it meant different things for different people.
“A championship for us meant the world,” Smith said. “We have a great university, and having the ability to show our university to the entire country through sports means a lot for everyone.”
WSU entered the 2007 NCAA tournament as a 14 seed and lost in the first round 79-58 to Pittsburgh. But Raider fans still remember the 2007 season as one of the best in team history.
“WSU is a great university that a lot of people don’t know about,” Donlon said. “Winning a conference tournament gets our name out there a little more [and] we get a little more play.”
