Brendan Grudberg ’28
Assistant Sports Editor
Each year, excitement in the NCAA postseason basketball tournaments is in the air as soon as March 1 hits. With hundreds of Division I teams competing in dozens of conference tournaments vying for a ticket to the big dance, phrases like “This Is March” are used ad nauseam on social media to caption these tournaments’ biggest and most inexplicable highlights. Our Holy Cross Crusaders men’s basketball team was, unfortunately, perhaps the very first victim of this aforementioned inexplicable “March Madness.”
With a few seconds left on the clock, and a 66-66 tie on the scoreboard, Nasir Whitlock of #2 seed Lehigh caught an inbounds pass in the backcourt and drained a shot from beyond half court to escape an upset by the #10 seeded Crusaders in the Patriot League quarterfinal. This moment ended the Crusaders’ season.
The clip was almost immediately posted onto the biggest of sports social media accounts. As the basketball world romanticized the outlandish nature of this shot, and the beloved time of year it had just brought forth, the Crusaders were left heartbroken. Their real chance of making the league semi-finals as the bottom seed in the tournament was snatched away in an instant.
We’re still in shock, we may still be heartbroken, but the basketball world moves quickly. In just the next round of the Patriot League tournament, #4 seed Boston University took down #1 juggernaut Navy on an equally ridiculous (and potentially… illegal?) shot. We can try to move forward ourselves, which involves answering two questions: how did we get here, and what comes next for the Crusaders’ men’s basketball team?
Before the season’s final buzzer sounded, the Patriot League tournament was going about as well as anyone could have expected for a bottom seed team missing one of its key starters in Junior sharpshooter Joe Nugent.
The Crusaders traveled to the #7 seed Lafayette Leopards in the opening round, a team who they were especially motivated to beat. The ‘Saders blew a 19-point lead to the Leopards in their last matchup, ultimately losing by three points on their home floor.
That was the second matchup between the Crusaders and Leopards this season, the first of which being a comfortable 19-point win when Lafayette hosted. There’s a cliché pervasive in NFL playoff discourse that goes something like, “It’s hard to beat the same team three times in a row,” and while I don’t necessarily subscribe to that paradoxical statement, Holy Cross certainly gave it validity in this playoff matchup.
It was a bend, don’t break first half for the Crusaders, trailing by just five points at the intermission. They then came out roaring to start the second half with an 18-4 run to go up by nine, with 13 of those 18 being scored by Aiden Disu and DeAndre Williams. Lafayette then fought back, taking the lead back a few times, but Holy Cross took the lead one last time at the seven-minute mark and did not look back.
Standout performers in this one were Gabe Warren and Tyler Boston. Down the home stretch, Warren had been playing his best basketball of the season, and certainly gave it his all to keep his team’s season alive.
In the first round matchup against Lafayette, Warren totaled 23 points, nine rebounds, and perhaps most impressive, 40 out of 40 minutes played.
Boston didn’t quite reach Warren’s scoring total (19), but tied his rebounding mark of nine and dished an astonishing 14 assists, outdoing his previous career high of six and placing himself in a three-way tie for the seventh-most single-game assists in Holy Cross men’s basketball history (goholycross.com).
One final note from round one–Holy Cross went a ridiculous 18-for-18 from the free throw line, their best free throw shooting performance ever (most makes without a miss according to goholycross.com).
In addition, there were definitely some positive takeaways to be made from round two. Holy Cross shot exceptionally from the free throw line again (20-22) against the #2 seed Lehigh Mountain Hawks, and battled adversity in a phenomenal two-sided game.
The Crusaders fell down early in this one, trailing 0-8, but cut their deficit to five by halftime, the same deficit they faced at halftime of the Lafayette game. Also, like that game, an early second half run put the Crusaders ahead, including eight straight points from Boston.
This would be the first of 12 lead changes in the second half, with neither team taking control. 18 of Boston’s team-high 24 came in this half, but it was Warren who came in clutch with a short jumper to put them up by two with 20 seconds left. Nasir Whitlock quickly equalized, Holy Cross turned it over, with a questionable lack of a foul call, and the rest is history.
Looking ahead to next season, barring no roster or coaching changes, the Patriot League tournament gave us something to be excited about. The backcourt duo of Boston and Warren should each contend for All-Patriot nominations, as they each averaged over 16 points per game over the last nine games of the season.
Joe Nugent should eventually return to bring his elite three-point shooting prowess, something the Crusaders could have used in the conference tournament (12-40 – 30%).
Beyond those guys, it’s encouraging to hear that none of the Crusaders’ seven-man playoff rotation will be lost to graduation. The Crusaders project to have a heavy senior class next season, something they have been missing over the last few years.
Look out for the development of first-year players like 6’11” big Tim Finau and 6’5” sharpshooter Jude Haigh who couldn’t get on the floor much this year, not to mention Aiden Disu who started 29 games in year one and improved greatly as the season went on.
But for now, we can continue our frustration by picking the Patriot League champion to get smoked by 40 in round one of the Big Dance, while holding envy deep down for their school’s accomplishment. Happy March!
Featured image courtesy of ESPN.com
Copy edited by Sophia Mariani ’26
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