UB plays a perfect game in WNIT

By Budd Bailey

Saturday night’s almost magical college basketball game was all so unexpected.

Local college basketball, Erie and Niagara Counties’ Division I version, had suffered through a winter to forget. Both the men’s and women’s teams from Canisius and Niagara couldn’t even qualify for the MAAC tournament, and they were joined on the sidelines by the University at Buffalo men’s team. The UB women had been the one bright spot, winning more than 20 games, but those Bulls lost in the semifinals of the MAC tournament.

Many of the Power 4 schools who came close to the NCAA tournament opted for the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament – a new invention this year. That left the others who felt like still playing for the Women’s National Invitation Tournament. Even good-sized fans hadn’t heard of some of the teams that were in the field. (Southern Indiana? Lindenwood?) But it was basketball in late March, and someone was keeping score.

UB started its postseason journey with an overtime win over the University of Massachusetts, and then had an easier time with the previously mentioned Southern Indiana. Returning home, a tall Rutgers team from the Big Ten figured to be a tough matchup for the Bulls – until one realized that the Scarlet Knights were 13-19 – 3-15 in conference play. Buffalo trailed at halftime but rallied to win. Cleveland State wasn’t easy either, but UB ended up 74-69 winners.

That set up Saturday’s final against Troy, which many fans couldn’t find on a map either. (Hint: Look for Montgomery, Alabama, and head southeast). The Trojans were 24-13 overall including an opening night loss in Alumni Arena of all places, and were 13-5 in the Sun Belt Conference. In other words, the teams at a glance had similar resumes.

What do you want out of a college basketball game? Let’s check off the boxes.

Something of a Cinderella Story. This is not a region known for postseason basketball success. St. Bonaventure won the men’s NIT back in 1977, and that team is still fondly remembered. Buffalo has reached the NCAA Tournament in the past, but it hasn’t played in April much. Having UB in any sort of tournament final seemed more than unlikely.

March Madness at Home. The win-or-go-home format of college basketball is inherently dramatic. A team can be literally one shot away from locker cleanout day. The chance to see a game like that in person doesn’t happen too often. When Western New York finally had the opportunity to see such a game in person, it reacted as if spring had arrived. For a game announced on Wednesday night to be sold out on Saturday morning is very impressive, at least by WNY standards. The Perfect Storm – a phrase usually applied to snow in these parts – came together in a good way here.  

A Terrific Game. Care to draw up the ingredients of an exciting win?  It has to have some drama, naturally, and the teams provided some. The teams were relatively close in the first period, but Troy shot the lights out (12 of 17 on field goals) in the second quarter to take a 10-point halftime lead. The Bulls spent all of the third quarter and part of the fourth quarter trying to come back, only to see the Trojans pull away a bit. Troy still had a five-point lead with about four minutes to go.

But as the Bulls have done frequently lately, they rallied. Buffalo finally took the lead with 2:52 left on a three-pointer by Terah Harness. The Trojans only scored three points in the final 3:12 – all by free throws with 18 seconds left. When Kirsten Lewis-Williams made a steal to ensure the win for UB, the noise level in Alumni Arena went up to numbers not reached since the glory days of Nate Oats’ men’s team of 2018.

Then there was the postgame ceremony. Championships aren’t exactly common around these parts – you may have noticed that – so it was good to see so many people so happy. Most Western New Yorkers haven’t seen nets cut down after a game.

Excellence everywhere. It was a particularly satisfying game because both teams played so well. Troy shot exactly 50 percent from the field and 84 percent from the line. Six Trojans scored in double figures. But Buffalo was almost as balanced with five players in double figures. Chellia Watson, the MVP of the tournament, finished with 23, but the others were terrific too. Lewis-Williams played one of her best games in a UB uniform. Lani Cornfield took good care of the ball with 11 assists and no turnovers. Harness had 17 points of the bench on 4 of 8 three-point shootings. Jordyn Beaty had 13 points including a crucial steal and layup that gave the Bulls a four-point lead with 1:45.

Add it up, and you might have one of the most memorable college basketball games ever played in Western New York. The last game that could be described that way came on December 15, 1984, when Niagara shocked – and that’s too weak a word - fourth-ranked St. John’s at the Niagara Falls Convention Center. The losers went on to the Final Four that year, and featured Chris Mullin, Mark Jackson and Walter Berry.

On the day after all of the fun at the newly christened Madhouse on Millersport, it’s tough to know what it will all mean. Watson, the go-to scorer, and Cornfield, the floor leader, are both seniors - although figuring out what that might mean to them in terms of eligibility to play some more is above my pay grade. Lewis-Williams probably will have some big schools call her about transferring. Then there’s head coach Becky Burke, who had a tough act to follow in Felisha Legette-Jack but has managed to lead the program to respectable heights. This may be the time to listen to offers if she’s interested in doing so … and most coaches usually are.

If nothing else, the Women’s NIT showed that people can be excited about something other than the NCAA Tournament when it comes to college basketball. Considering the way that the power schools seem determined to hog all of the spotlight in March, maybe it’s time to look at some sort of Division I-AA tournament. The distance between the haves and have-nots is growing by the year because of the transfer portal and NIL payments, and it’s not likely to shrink. If that sort of event is created, games should not be played at neutral sites. Let them be home games for the better seed in order to create more memories.

All of that talk is for the future, naturally. The immediate past is what UB fans will cherish for quite a while. They’ll think back to that game in early April, which was simply perfect.  

(Follow Budd on X.com via @WDX2BB)