Bison Waiting For Their Shot in First Four Game Against North Carolina Central

NDSU takes on the Eagles Wednesday night in the NCAA Tournament

DAYTON, Ohio – The NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament is underway, and North Dakota State is waiting for its shot.

The Bison play in the First Four Wednesday night against the North Carolina Central Eagles.

North Dakota State was certainly not the favorite to win to win the Summit League at the beginning of the season, or in the middle or even heading into the conference tournament. Nonetheless, the Bison found a way to get to the big dance.

“You take a couple losses and you get a little hurt and get a little flustered and then you bounce back and you turn into who you really are. Then you wake up and realize you don’t want to lose anymore. I think that’s what it took for us. Just a gut-check a couple times and come together and talk about what we want to do and how we want to do it,” Junior Guard Tyson Ward said.

“To start off with, we were struggling a little bit, but we got hot at the right time, obviously ended up the season in the conference tournament going pretty well,” Sophomore Forward Rocky Kreuser said.

The team says they hit their turning point two months ago.

“You go back to January 24th at South Dakota State, we got our tails kicked in. From there, our group has really responded,” Head Coach Dave Richman said.

That loss was number eight in a row in true road games. Then, the script changed.

“We won five in a row, and even in that three game slide we feel like we played a good brand of basketball. We just weren’t able to finish some things,” Richman explained.

“I think this team did a really good job of growing together. You hear a lot of things about this group being inexperienced and young. I think we did a good job of growing together as a group throughout the season, and that’s why we’re playing our best basketball now,” Junior Guard and Summit League Tournament MVP Vinnie Shahid said.

Since dropping those eight road games, the bison have won seven of their last eight away from The Shac.

The NCAA tournament is always looking for the latest Cinderella story. NDSU is striving to be that team. And what better place for it to start than Dayton, Ohio, the birthplace of Orville Wright. One of the fathers of aviation teaching us that the sky is the limit.

The Bison and Eagles square off at 5:40 PM central time on TruTV and MarchMadness.com