Anticipation was high for the Miner basketball teams as the 1995-96 basketball seasons began, but little did anyone expect the level of success and excitement those two teams brought to the university and Rolla community that winter.  Two teams, two seasons of 20-plus wins and national rankings, two regular season championships, a conference tournament title and a Sweet 16 appearance was the final tally.  Here's the story of how all of that unfolded.

Telling the story of a successful season – or in this case, two of them – involves some context in terms of what led to it.  In the case of the two Missouri S&T teams from the 1995-96 campaign, one would need to look at the previous season to see where the foundation developed.

The 1994-95 Lady Miner season, a 15-12 campaign, ended in the first round of the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletic Association Tournament for the fourth straight year.   The good news heading into the 1995-96 season was that the roster was essentially intact with fifth-year point guard Christie Williams, a dynamic scorer in Becky Reichard who averaged 16.5 points per game in being named as the Co-Freshman of the Year in the MIAA and a pair of post players in Heather Hartman and Tobi Rees that head coach Linda Roberts was considering using on the floor together.

The men's team, meanwhile, roared out of the gate in the 1994-95 season with wins in eight of its first 10 contests and  splitting its first two MIAA games before a blown engine derailed the season.  Injuries wiped out the front line and the suddenly undersized Miners would drop 13 of their final 14 contests to finish at 10-16.  The Miners had reason to be optimistic too as they would return not only the two posts, Jamie Brueggeman and Jeff Kokal, but also leading scorer Tim Holloway and Marc Tompkins, who was pressed into a larger role as a freshman when the injuries hit. 

"We were not as bad as our overall record indicated because we were so devastated by the injuries," said the team's head coach Dale Martin in an article published in the MSM-UMR Alumnus following that season.  "We were 8-2 going into the conference season, then we lost Jamie and Jeff.  With a healthy team and a little added help at a couple of positions, I thought we could have a good year and compete for the conference championship."

Two of those new additions for the Miners were significant -- former Springfield Glendale High School teammates Terry Smith, a transfer from Iowa Western and Michael McClain, who had played the previous year at the University of Washington.  Their presence swayed the perception of the Miners in the eyes of the MIAA coaches as S&T, who finished last in the conference in 1994-95, was picked to finish fifth in the 12-team conference.  The Lady Miners didn't get that same feeling from their peer group as they were tabbed for seventh, one place lower than they finished the previous season.

Starting out strong in non-conference play

The pre-season schedule for the Lady Miners included three weekend classics, a road contest against Southern Illinois Edwardsville and would conclude with a game against Kansas State before MIAA play started in January.  The Lady Miners were perfect through the first nine of those contests, including a 24-point win over a Henderson State team had won 21 times a year earlier and a tough road win at SIUE where the post players, Hartman and Rees, combined for 32 points.   S&T did drop the Kansas State game, but was taking a 9-1 record and top 25 ranking into its MIAA opener at Lincoln.

"We tried to play teams that could help us get ready for the league," said Linda Roberts, the head coach of the team in an article published in the MSM-UMR Alumnus in the summer of 1996.  "It started to create the mindset that we're going to play some teams and be challenged.  I think we could have lost some of those games and still achieved what we achieved.  However, it was important for us to know that we could go up against great athletic teams such as Henderson State and win."

The Miners also buzzed through most of their pre-conference schedule, starting out the year with six straight wins that included a 16-point victory over an Eckerd team that was ranked 14^th nationally in the pre-season.  After stubbing its toe at Drury in mid-December, the Miners also reached 9-1 before the start of conference play with wins over Lyon, Central Washington and an impressive victory at Seattle Pacific where they led by as much as 30 early in the second half.

Establishing itself as a contender
 

For the Lady Miners, the MIAA season started out with a rout of Lincoln in Jefferson City, but immediately hit a bump in the road when they lost a 16-point decision at Northwest Missouri State that sent S&T out of the national rankings.  However, it regrouped upon returning home as it picked up a win over Missouri-St. Louis and then used a strong second half performance to down a Southwest Baptist team that had been a thorn in their side for a couple of seasons.

"The biggest key to the 21-victory season was the consistency of this team," Roberts said.  "If we had an off night or somebody just outplayed and beat us, let's get to the next game and focus on it – just keep moving forward.  We were able to do that until the very end of the season."

The Lady Miners extended their winning streak to three with a hard-fought road win at Northeast Missouri State (now Truman State), then suffered their second conference loss in a three-point setback at Pittsburg State to a Gorilla team that was undefeated in the MIAA.  At 4-2 in league play, the Lady Miners were returning home for an intriguing three-game homestand that was starting with contests against Washburn and Central Missouri, two teams a game ahead of them in the standings.

Finding a way out of danger

The quest to capture the first conference title for the program in 20 seasons began with a nine-point road win at Lincoln on Jan. 3 to end a 16-game road losing streak in MIAA play, thus setting up an early showdown in Maryville between the Miners and Northwest Missouri State, another team that had designs on reversing course on a sub-par 1994-95 season to contend for the top spot in the conference.

The Bearcats won the first of the two scheduled contests by the score of 71-66, then the Miners dropped a one-point home decision to Missouri-St. Louis and found themselves staring at a 19-point deficit on their home floor to Southwest Baptist with 13:08 to play.  With the season possibly careening to a 1-3 start in the MIAA, it was the transfer from the Pacific-10 Conference that came to the rescue.
 

McClain scored 10 straight points for the Miners to allow them to trim the lead down to 11 in three minutes (SBU scored a basket in the midst of that spurt), then he scored six in row a short time later to draw S&T to within three.  With 4:49 to go, McClain's former high school teammate and now running mate in the backcourt, Smith, drained a three-pointer to tie the score.

However, SBU was able to regain the advantage and had a three-point lead in the final seconds when McClain missed a three, but got the ball back after Tompkins grabbed the offensive rebound and drained a long three with eight seconds left to send the game to overtime.

McClain had scored 19 points in the final 13-plus minutes to get the Miners into overtime, then S&T outscored the Bearcats 21-6 – with seven more of those points coming from McClain as he finished with a career-high 30 points -- in the extra period to even its conference record at 2-2.

"I think that was one of the turning points of our season," McClain said.  "We were 1-2 and if we lost, we would have been 1-3, meaning we could have started pointing fingers or panicking.  Instead, we got a lot more confidence from it knowing we could play poorly and still find a way to win."

The Miners followed that win with a game in which they shot a then season-high 63.5 percent from the field at Northeast Missouri State, but still needed a late three-pointer from Smith to get the lead for good in the 81-77 win.  Then, three days later, S&T ended up in another overtime game at Pittsburg State in which McClain again hit a three-pointer to extend the contest, but the Miners lost that game to drop to 3-3 in the MIAA.

An unexpected hero saves the day

There are times during the course of a season when unlikely heroes suddenly emerge. 

The Lady Miners had added only three players to the roster for the 1995-96 season and heading into their Jan. 24 game against Washburn at the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building, the one who had seen the most playing time was Beth Ragsdale.  A transfer from Southwestern Illinois College, Ragsdale had played in every game as a backup point guard and was averaging about 18 minutes per game. 

She came into the game averaging just under five points and about two assists per game, but she was able to provide offense from long range off the bench as S&T's second-leading shooter from three-point range behind Reichard.  On this night, it was her shooting from beyond the arc that may well have saved the Lady Miners' title dreams.
 

The Lady Miners were down by eight with 3:14 to play, but clawed back to within one with a 7-0 run that was capped when Rees made two free throws with 35 seconds remaining.  The Lady Blues missed a free throw attempt with 11 seconds left and Williams was fouled after grabbing the rebound, but she missed the front end of a one-and-one; Washburn's Emily Shopper was then fouled and she made both attempts to extend the Lady Blues' lead to three.

But with four seconds left, Ragsdale wound up with the ball nearly 25 feet away from the basket and launched a shot that swished through the bottom of the net to tie the score and send the contest into overtime.  Ragsdale, who connected five times from three-point land that night, hit another trey in overtime to spark another rally that culminated in a victory for the Lady Miners, as Reichard found Rees for a game-winning layup with two seconds left in a game S&T led for a grand total of only 22 seconds.

"After that game, I really started to think that we could win it," Williams said in the aforementioned article.  "Everybody on the team did something during the year that was critical for us to win games.  No one person had to step up all year long; it was different individuals throughout the season."

On this night, it was Beth Ragsdale's turn.  The next time out, all five Lady Miners scored in double figures to lead them to a 70-59 win over Central Missouri that drew them even with the Jennies in the standings.  A few days later in the final game of the homestand, Reichard had 21 points to pace the Lady Miners to a 73-62 win over an emerging Emporia State team that put them into a four-way tie for the MIAA lead.

Time to recalibrate

In the loss at Pittsburg State, the Miners hoisted up 37 three-point shots among their 60 overall attempts.  It prompted Martin to spend time in the practices leading up to a key homestand to get the Miners back into more of a half-court and tougher defensive mindset.  Those practices leading up to matchups against Washburn and Central Missouri, the top two picks in the MIAA's pre-season poll and surprise league leader Emporia State brought about the desired results.

The Miners bottled up Washburn in the first game of that homestand, holding the Ichabods to 31 percent shooting and its star, USC transfer Dan Buie, to five-of-16 from the field in a 13-point win.  Three nights later, S&T held Central Missouri to 34 percent from the floor and shot 62.5 percent in the second half itself, outscoring the Mules 51-38 in a 74-67 victory before another large crowd in the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building.

Holloway had 22 points in the win over Central and came up big again in a 73-63 win over Emporia State that brought the Miners to within a game of the league leaders.  The Miners would extend their winning streak to five with road wins over Missouri Southern behind Smith's season-best 28 points and Missouri Western, where S&T shackled the Griffons from long range as they made only two-of-13 from beyond the arc.

Next up was round two against Northwest – this time in Rolla – with a chance to move into a tie for the conference lead with a victory.  But after coming out of the first half in a tied game, the Bearcats scored the first eight points of the second half to take the lead.  The Miners came back and reclaimed the advantage with just under 10 minutes left on a Smith three-pointer, but after S&T took its final lead on a Kokal free throw at the 6:30 mark, Northwest got a three-point from Kelvin Alford on its next trip down the floor and never trailed again, winning the contest 72-63.

The Miners were now sitting two games out of the lead with four games remaining … and two of those remaining games were against teams that had already defeated the Miners starting with a game at Missouri-St. Louis in four days.

Bouncing back once again
 

Frigid weather rolled into Missouri around the time the homestand came to a close and Young Gymnasium was freezing on the night the Lady Miners went to Joplin to take on a Missouri Southern team still trying to find its footing.  The cold weather carried into S&T's shooting in the first half that night as it made only 33.3 percent of its shots in the first half and was unable to make up a 14-point deficit to fall to 7-3 in the MIAA.

As had been the case after earlier losses, the Lady Miners' answer was bouncing right back.  They went on the road to post a double-digit win over defending conference champion Missouri Western, avenged the earlier loss to Northwest with an 80-66 win at home and dominated Missouri-St. Louis from the opening tip of an 83-57 win in St. Louis.

But again, another hurdle to the title fell into S&T's path three nights after the UMSL win, as Southwest Baptist jumped the Lady Miners by scoring the first 12 points of the game and holding a double figure lead for nearly the entire contest in an eventual 74-60 win.  The loss put the Lady Miners two games out of first place with two games remaining on the schedule.

Finding their way back to first place

The title dreams were teetering once again in the middle of the week in St. Louis, where Missouri-St. Louis was making life difficult for the Miners.  With 8:56 to play in the second half, the Rivermen led by six and the Miners were in a scoring drought from the floor as they had not made a field goal in nearly five minutes.

Twenty-one seconds later, Holloway knocked down a three-pointer – only the third of the night for S&T -- to cut the lead in half and suddenly, UMSL was unable to score as the Miner defense began to lock down the Rivermen.  With 4:02 left, the Miners took the lead on a McClain lay-up and Holloway would extend the margin to three as he banked in a jumper with 2:12 remaining before it became white-knuckle time for the Miners.

Missouri S&T did not score in the final two minutes and 12 seconds of the game, but aside from a basket by UMSL's Eric Bickel with just under two minutes left, neither did the Rivermen.  The Miners missed three free throws in the final minute, but the Miners got a stop as the buzzer sounded to escape with the 60-59 win, then won their final road game of the season over Southwest Baptist and that game came to a close, S&T was in a much better place.

During the week following its win over the Miners, Northwest returned home for its final two home contests beginning with a game against a Northeast Missouri State team that was 1-11 in the MIAA.  On the night the Miners were pulling out the win at UMSL, Northeast stunned Northwest 66-58 to close the gap in the standings to a game.  Then as the Miners were closing out their win at SBU, the Bearcats stumbled again on their home floor as Pittsburg State handed Northwest an 86-82 loss.

The Miners were returning to Rolla in a tie for first place in the MIAA with two home games remaining – those being against the two teams that had just left Maryville in the past week with victories.

Taking advantage of the opportunity

With their contest against Northeast on Feb. 21 well in hand, a yellow slip of paper was passed down to the Lady Miner bench.  The paper had two results from other games in the MIAA that night – Missouri Western had upset Central Missouri and Missouri Southern, who had not lost since beating S&T, handed Washburn a loss.  A collective scream came from the bench area after the results were read to them during a media timeout because the Lady Miners knew what that meant.

They would play for a title in three days.  On their home floor.

After closing out the Bulldogs, the Lady Miners' focus went to the Saturday night game against Pittsburg State and S&T made sure it was going to get its share of the title.  The Lady Miners scored the first eight points of the contest – six of them by Ondrea Bermudez – 14 of the first 15 and 24 of the first 32 to take a 16-point lead just nine minutes into play.  There was no let-up from there, as the Gorillas only got as close as 12 in the first half and after a brief run by Pitt State early in the second half, the Lady Miners used a 11-4 burst to break free and go on to the 82-59 win.

"That was probably the most satisfying victory because that was the most pressurized game they had to play in," Roberts said.  "They were focused and driven and it was one of the best games we played all year."

The Lady Miners finished in a tie for the regular season title – the first in program history – with Pittsburg State and Central Missouri.  Two days after knocking off Pitt State, S&T returned to the court for the first round of the MIAA Tournament to take on a Missouri Southern team that was on a seven-game winning streak and had a shooting performance in the first half that night which was even colder than the one it experienced in Joplin earlier in the month.

S&T made only four of their 29 field goal attempts in the first half and even though it trailed by only four at the half – Southern wasn't much better by going just five-of-24 – the Lady Miners could never gain the lead in the second half and lost 55-53.  That put the team into a week-long waiting game to see if the season was going to continue in the NCAA Division II Tournament, even with their 21-6 record.

Smelling a conference title … and more
 

On the bus ride home from Bolivar after the Miners had moved into a tie for first place, a lot of talk was taking place among the players about the NCAA Division II Tournament that none of the team members had ever experienced.  The Miners were in a good position to make the tournament as they were at that point in time ranked fourth in the NCAA South Central region – but found themselves in a much better situation when the new rankings were released on the Monday prior to the Northeast game.

Missouri S&T had moved to the No. 1 spot in the region.  That meant the Miners were not only in a solid position to make the tournament, they also had the inside track to hosting the regional.  But first, they had a regular season championship to win and two wins would assure S&T, now ranked eighth nationally, of no worse than a share of the MIAA title.

The Miners opened the game against Northeast by scoring 10 of the first 12 points and took as much as a 14-point lead in the first half.   Northeast cut the lead to six by halftime and was able to stay within striking distance for a good chunk of the second half, cutting the Miner lead to one on a Brian Basich three-pointer with 1:15 remaining.  Holloway made two free throws with 38 seconds to go to push the lead back to three, then McClain made the defensive play of the night in the waning seconds as he stole the ball from Basich, allowing S&T to close out the win at the free throw line.

Northwest won its game the following night at Southwest Baptist, meaning the Miners needed a win over Pittsburg State on the last night of the season to gain at least one-half of the crown.  S&T would also be playing this game without Brueggeman, their leading rebounder and shot blocker, as he became ill after the Northeast game.  But with the crowd still buzzing after the Lady Miners had clinched their part of the MIAA title earlier in the evening, the Miners followed suit by flying out of the gate as they outscored Pitt State 23-4 to begin the game.

S&T was able to hold off the Gorillas down the stretch for the 84-76 victory, making the Miners the regular season champions of the MIAA for the first time since 1976.  Northwest also won at UMSL, so S&T would go into the MIAA Tournament as the second seed due to its two losses to the Bearcats during the season.

The first opponent in the tournament for the Miners would be Washburn, who they defeated with a strong defensive effort just over a month earlier.  Defense was not in the script on this night, as in what was certainly one of the wildest and most entertaining game to ever take place in the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building, the Miners came away with a 112-104 win.  After being held in check in the first meeting, MIAA scoring leader Dan Buie exploded for 45 points in the rematch -- but it wasn't enough to offset a combined 73 from Smith, Holloway and Kokal as the Miners advanced to the semifinals.

While the Miners were finishing off that win, Northwest and eighth-seeded Pittsburg State were heading to overtime.  About 15 minutes later, with a sizeable number of fans still in the building awaiting the outcome of that game, the Gorillas had claimed a 101-98 win that meant the Miners would remain at home for the rest of the MIAA Tournament.

S&T held off UMSL 74-69 in the semifinals to earn a date in the championship game against Central Missouri, where it used a 16-7 second half run to get the lead for good in that contest.  With the Miners hanging onto a one-point lead with under 30 seconds to go, Kokal rebounded a Smith miss and got the ball to Holloway, who proceeded to hit two free throws to extend the lead to three.  Moments later, Kokal and Tompkins combined to make a steal that locked up the conference tournament championship and automatic bid to the NCAA Division II Tournament.

Excitement about March Madness

Fortunately for the Lady Miners, the NCAA expanded the regional fields for the 1995-96 season from four teams to six, meaning a couple of more slots were available for them to land into to be a part of the regional field.   After a few minutes of nailbiting through the NCAA's Sunday afternoon video presentation, the Lady Miners' name appeared on the screen that let them know they were heading to Abilene, Texas to face Nebraska-Kearney in the first round on Thursday.

There was no suspense when the men's show came on as the Miners already knew they were in the field.  The only remaining questions were whether or not the Miners would retain the top spot in the region and get to serve as the host for the tournament.

The answer to both questions was yes.  The Miners were going to be on their home floor playing for a chance to go to the Elite Eight.

A disappointing end to a historic season

While the Lady Miners were provided the opportunity to continue their season, the shooting touch that had abandoned them in the conference tournament never returned when the regional began.  S&T fell behind by 11 in the first five minutes of the contest and made only 38 percent of its shots from the field to 56 percent for UNK, falling into a 12-point deficit at halftime and seeing the margin grow beyond 20 in the second half of an eventual 83-60 loss.

Despite the disappointing close to the campaign, the Lady Miners still had a season for the history books.  Reichard finished eighth in the MIAA in scoring with her average of 16.5 points per game and earned second-team all-conference honors, while Hartman and Rees both ranked among the top seven in the conference in rebounding; Hartman, an honorable mention All-MIAA selection, also ranked among the league leaders in field goal percentage and blocked shots.  Meanwhile, Williams finished the year with 124 assists and 60 steals while averaging in double figures in the scoring column.

"This was a dream that I had since my second year here," Williams said at the close of the season.  "I realized how tough it was in the MIAA and I think as a team we started to realize what it was going to take to get there.  Just the fact that so many people put their heart and soul into achieving what we set out to do really made it more than I could hope for.

"It was the best high I ever had playing basketball," Williams added.

The quest to reach the Elite Eight falls just short

As the top seed, the Miners would not play until the Friday semifinal round and would not know their opponent until late Thursday night, as Central Missouri and East Texas State (now known as Texas A&M-Commerce) were playing the second game of the evening.  That game wound up going to overtime and the Mules earned a third meeting with the Miners by edging the Lions 89-86 in overtime.

On the opposite side of the bracket, third-seeded North Alabama slogged through a first round win over fellow Gulf South Conference member Delta State, then knocked off second-seeded Texas A&M-Kingsville (who also had a first round bye) 85-80 in the game that preceded the S&T-Central Missouri contest.   The Miners, as was the case in the first two meetings with the Mules, fought tooth and nail for much of the night but were able to make the key play to decide things in the second half.

In this instance, with the Miners clinging to a two-point lead, it was a clutch, NBA-range three-pointer by McClain as the shot clock expired that sparked an 8-0 run to give S&T a 10-point lead with 3:14 to go.  The Miners then got two more clutch baskets late from their posts – a lay-up by Kokal and a tip-in by Brueggeman – to hold off Central's late rally hopes and send the Miners to the regional championship game.

With another sellout crowd in attendance for the title contest, North Alabama opened the game by scoring on 11 of its first 12 possessions and took as much as a 19-point lead in the first half.  The Lions led by 16 at the intermission, but the Miners, behind the three-point shooting of Smith, cut the UNA lead down to four with under seven minutes remaining.

However, the rally effort stalled there as the Lions outscored the Miners 11-1 over the next three minutes and went on to a 92-80 win that ended the Miners' magnificent run.

"I knew we had the talent, but you never know how a season is going to turn out," Smith said.  "We came together in the middle of the season, but I never thought it was going to turn out like this."

The end of the season also saw the Miners duly honored for their efforts, led by McClain being named as the MIAA's co-most valuable player (along with Buie) and earning a spot on Division II Bulletin's All-America team after dishing out a school record 231 assists.  McClain was also a first-team All-MIAA selection, while Brueggeman was named to the second team and Holloway and Smith were honorable mention picks.

Martin, the MIAA's "Coach of the Year" for the 1995-96 season, saw the chemistry the team developed as the key ingredient to the success it had.

"As this season played on, the team took on a tremendous personality," Martin said.  "I had several meetings with the players during the summer and again in the fall and every time we would talk about what was needed for us to win – the competitiveness, the never-give-up attitude and just the will to compete and win.  These guys knew in the fall that they had a chance to do something special."