Wright State University (WSU) celebrated their men’s basketball senior players on Sunday, Feb. 22 at 2 p.m. in their game against Robert Morris University (RMU) at the Nutter Center.
This specific men’s basketball game was special, for not only the WSU seniors celebrating senior night, but also every player on the court as this game was aired on ESPNU, which is ESPN's channel dedicated to college athletics. This game also had an outcome of 4,659 fans in attendance.
The Raiders, who were never able to take the lead, lost the game with an unfortunate outcome of the RMU men’s team storming the court for the ESPNU post-game interview and the final score of 81-68 RMU. The game, despite the loss, was full of emotion and fouls on both ends.
At the end of the game, when the courts cleared, WSU took the time to set up framed jerseys of the WSU seniors, and each walked out with their loved ones.
The seniors included number 1 forward Bryan Etumnu, number 2 guard Sam Alamutu, number 21 guard Logan Woods and graduate student number 33 forward Michael Imariagbe.
Head Coach Clint Sargent talked about how he felt about the loss and the recognition of the seniors.
“You know my heart breaks that we couldn’t just kind of seize the moment for those 4 seniors and our fan base, it’s just very odd we clinch a share, but I felt there was so much more out there for us to take with today's effort. So, we’re disappointed by it, but we’ll learn from it like I know this team has done and will do,” Sargent said.
WSU just recently clinched the share of the Horizon League regular-season title and the first-round home advantage at the Nutter Center for the Horizon League men’s basketball championship.
Freshman guard, Michael Cooper, reflected on what these advantages meant to the team.
“We try not to be satisfied, obviously we want to win it outright, right now we clinch the share. So, we're definitely not satisfied, and we wanted to do it for the seniors tonight, to win it all but we still got two more games to do that, so we're going to move past it,” Cooper said.
With the seniors coming off of this loss, they still plan to continue to fight to the end and do better for the rest of the season and the team.
Imariagbe explained what his focus will be, as one of the seniors finishing out his final season.
“I feel like you just got to be laser-focused, you know you can’t have more slip-ups as of right now. And I feel like you got to just go to every game like it's right there, so that’s really it. Discipline is the biggest thing,” Imariagbe said.
The Raiders will finish out their regular season on the road against Purdue Fort Wayne on Feb. 25 and then Northern Kentucky on Feb. 28. Following the regular season schedule, the Raiders will head back home to the Nutter Center for the Horizon League Championship first round game Wednesday, March 4 at 7 p.m.
Checkout this game's Guardian Gallery!
