St. Thomas falls to Omaha in Summit League championship game that didn’t come with NCAA invitation

St. Thomas lost its first Summit League men’s basketball championship game 85-75 to Nebraska Omaha on Sunday night in Sioux Falls, in a game that wouldn’t have earned the Tommies a NCAA tournament invitation anyway.

They will have to wait one more season for that.

The second-seeded Tommies finished their fourth Division I season with a 24-10 record and a runner-up finish in their conference tournament. They are ineligible to qualify for the NCAA tournament until next season because of probationary rules applied during the Tommies’ transition from Division III to D-I that started in 2021.

“This is our 131st Division I game, we never had a chance to go to the tournament this year and we knew that,” St. Thomas coach Johnny Tauer said in a postgame press conference. “It was fine. Everybody likes to talk about that and we understand that. I don’t think you ever heard us lament that. We understand that’s the deal.”

Summit League commissioner Josh Fenton offered “special congratulations” to St. Thomas during the post-tournament awards “for an incredible season. We look forward to them being eligible next year.”

Omaha’s Marquel Sutton provided his team’s pulse Sunday with 22 points and 18 rebounds despite early foul trouble. J.J. White scored 28 points.

The top-seeded Mavericks turned Sutton’s play into a 39-33 halftime lead. The Tommies missed 14 consecutive shots to end the first half and start the second and fell behind by double digts.

St. Thomas shot 40% from the field and 62% from the free-throw line.

The Tommies trailed by 15 points early in the second half, but closed that deficit to 79-73 in the final minutes. But they missed too many free throws and were beaten badly in second-chance points.

Nolan Minessale led St. Thomas with 20.

“It stings to lose when you put all that effort in,” St. Thomas junior guard Kendall Blue said. “If you told us in June we’d be in the Summit League championship game, maybe we’d not believe it, or maybe we would. I’m going to just be a leader and get guys motivated to use as motivation next year.”

BOXSCORE: Nebraska Omaha 85, St. Thomas 75

The Mavericks already had celebrated their automatic invitation to the NCAA tournament at their hotel Saturday night. As regular-season champions, they would have gotten the Summit League’s automatic bid had St. Thomas won Sunday.

The Tommies themselves had only a trophy for which to play because of a probationary period that was originally five years, then changed in January to four.

“I couldn’t be prouder of all our guys, the way they competed all year,” Tauer said. “Inspiring is a word I keep coming back to, Twenty-four wins, but it’s not just that. What they’ve done for this program over the first four years of our Division I journey is remarkable. Although tonight didn’t go their way, I couldn’t be prouder of their effort 34 times this year.

“They played fearlessly, they played together.”

Said Tommies guard Drake Dobbs: “It has been a long journey, proud of our guys. The first season was really tough. The program has gotten better. We’re still on the rise. I hope the guys still in the program remember it and use it as fuel going forward.”