Nirmalendu Majumdar/Ames Tribune / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
Over the weekend, Omaha officially punched its ticket to March Madness and earned a victory in the Summit League championship game. The conference did what it could to prevent the Mavericks from beating up another innocent trash can in the wake of the win, but the team went out of its way to ensure it could still partake in the best new tradition to come out of this year’s college basketball season.
The Omaha Mavericks finished the 2023-24 campaign with a 15-18 record, and there wasn’t much evidence to suggest they’d stage a dramatic turnaround this year or even come close to getting their first-ever invite to the NCAA Tournament since making the leap to the Division I level midway through the 2010s.
However, the team managed to do exactly that by finishing the regular season with a 22-12 record while winning the Summit League and the conference tournament that wrapped up on Sunday.
It goes without saying it’s pretty hard to do that without having a talented basketball team, but you can’t ignore another factor inextricably linked to the team’s success: the postgame trash can beatdowns that got plenty of attention after an assistant coach inadvertently ushered in a new tradition by trying to fire his guys up at the beginning of what turned out to be a lengthy winning streak.
Omaha’s March Madness fate was already sealed by the time they faced off against St. Thomas in the championship showdown; the Tommies are currently ineligible for the NCAA Tournament (they were in the final year of their own DI transition), which means the Mavericks secured the automatic bid the second their opponents beat North Dakota in the semifinal round.
With that said, there was still pride on the line when the two squads faced off inside the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center in Sioux Falls on Sunday before Omaha won the Summit League tournament for the first time with an 85-75 victory.
During the broadcast, CBS Sports noted the Summit League asked Omaha to refrain from beating up any trash cans that technically belong to the venue hosting the tournament, and while they respected those wishes, they came prepared with the one that was used as a stand for the trophy they were presented with after the win.
The honors ultimately went to the team’s mascot Durango, the bull that put its horns to good use in the locker room.
You’ve gotta love college basketball.