PITTSBURGH -- Kentucky helped create another college basketball folk hero on Thursday in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament.
Jack Gohlke, a grad senior guard who played five years at the Division II level prior to joining the Oakland Golden Grizzlies this season, fell one shy of a new NCAA Tournament record with 10 3-pointers and scored a game-high 32 points in a stunning 80-76 upset of the third-seeded Wildcats at PPG Paints Arena.
"I'm always pretty much just locked into the game," Gohlke said of the game of his life. "Obviously, I'm feeling the emotion of it, for sure, but just focused on trying to make the next shot, trying to win for my teammates."
On this night, it seemed like the Wisconsin native could not miss, even though he did come up empty on 10 of his 20 attempts. He joked with teammates that he was upset because he thought he should have made 13 treys.
"I'm always mad if I miss one, even if I was 10 of 11," Gohlke said. "So I'm just always looking for the next play, like Coach Kampe always says, and just living in the moment."
"That's my boy right there. Jimmy (Chitwood). Jimmy Gohlke," said Oakland head coach Greg Kampe, who suggested on Wednesday that one of his players could play the 'Hoosiers' hero role in a memorable upset.
Kentucky could only tip its proverbial caps.
"Some unbelievable shots," UK head coach John Calipari said.
"You know, we was in his face and it was kind of, you know, one of those things where, you know, it's March," said Wildcats senior guard Antonio Reeves.
It felt all too familiar.
Just as Saint Peter's Doug Edert did in the 2022 NCAA Tournament, the small-school sharpshooter had a massive scoring effort off the bench and sent Kentucky (23-10) home early. The Cats have lost four of their last five tourney games and have not reached the Sweet 16 since 2019.
Fourteen-seed Oakland (23-12) advances to the second round to face the winner of tonight's matchup between six-seed Texas Tech and 11-seed NC State.
To get there, the Grizzlies made 15 of their 31 shots from beyond the arc. In addition to Gohlke's big night, junior guard DQ Cole went 3-for-3 from long range, including a fall-away dagger from the left corner with 28 seconds remaining that sealed Kentucky's fate after the Cats had cut the lead to one.
"We just win close games. We've done it all year," Kampe said. "We lost a very close one to Ohio State and a very close one to Illinois. We learned from those games. When we beat Xavier in a close game, we knew we were a special team."
Kentucky got 27 points from Reeves, but the All-American got little help from his talented freshman backcourt mates. Rob Dillingham and Reed Sheppard were held to a combined 13 points on 3-for-14 shooting from the field.
Senior center/forward Tre Mitchell had a double-double with 14 points and 13 rebounds in his final game for the Cats.
*****
In this "Rapid Recap" feature, we touch on some quick-hitters from the UK loss...
KEY MOMENT:
After Kentucky trimmed a seven-point deficit to one on a Rob Dillingham 3-pointer with 1:03 remaining, the Wildcats may have been one defensive stop away from squashing the Cinderella story. But the season-long bugaboo reared its ugly head once again, and the Cats could not get it done on the defensive end of the floor. Oakland point guard Rocket Watts found teammate DQ Cole open in the left corner with 29 seconds remaining, and Cole hit a fall-away 3-pointer while crashing into his teammates' celebrating arms on the Oakland bench.
GAME BALL:
Jack Gohlke, Oakland -- Who else, right? A career-high 32 points and 10-of-20 shooting from the 3-point arc makes this an easy call.
BY THE NUMBERS:
3-7 - Kentucky's record when trailing at halftime this season. Oakland led 38-35 at the intermission.
14 - Three-pointers were the most made by a UK opponent in an NCAA Tournament game.
-18 - After leading the nation in 3-point shooting percentage this season, Kentucky lost the scoring column from long range by six shots, 15-9.
40-21 - Oakland's bench-scoring advantage over the Cats, including 32 by Jack Gohlke.
40-39 - The smaller Grizzlies won the rebounding battle. Horizon League Player of the Year Trey Townsend led the way with 12 boards.
49-12 - Kentucky's all-time record in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament.
QUOTABLE:
"We've gotta figure out who's coming back and who's not. We got this transfer stuff going on. We may not need it. We have an unbelievable group coming in that I feel really good about. We add some guys and they stay... I'll meet with them tonight. I talked to them after. But I'm going to meet with them in my room tonight, and these guys took this really hard. I mean, they took it really hard." -- UK head coach John Calipari on the future of his program.
UP NEXT:
Kentucky enters an off-season that is expected to see major turnover in the roster and perhaps a difficult decision by UK Athletics Director Mitch Barnhart regarding leadership of the program.
