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Men’s basketball team wins second NCAA Division II title in the past three years under coach Ben McCollum.

As the players were on the court holding up the trophy, confetti rained down and the cutting of the basketball net commenced.

The fans in the stadium and those watching from home cheered for their champions together. Decked out from head to toe in green and white, devoted Bearcat fans roared throughout the crowd as records were broken once more and won their second NCAA Division II National Championship in Evansville, Ind. on March 30, 2019.

The five starters for the team include: senior Joey Witthus, junior Ryan Welty, sophomore Ryan Hawkins, redshirt freshman Trevor Hudgins and freshman Diego Bernard. Starting only one true freshman, Diego, and a redshirt freshman, Trevor and one sophomore allowed the team to grow.

“The amount of work that we put in this year and showing up to every practice wanting to get better and wanting to learn,” Witthus said. “It’s a really special team and we had a lot of guys step up this year and this tournament and that shows how special this group is."

Witthus was named both regional player of the year, national player of the year and scored 24 points in the national championship game.

Hawkins had a total of four steals and was ranked 10th in the nation for steals, had 12 rebounds and brought the energy at the end of the first half with a buzzer beater which led to a halftime score of 33-29, leading the game by four points against the Point Loma Sea Lions.

Bernard had the second most scoring points in the game with 14 points.

Starters Hudgins, Hawkins and Witthus did not miss a minute as they were on the court for the entirety of the championship game.

“Being apart of the Women’s basketball team and traveling with them, watching them compete has been amazing,” Sophomore Mia Sillman said. “As a whole this entire season those guys went into every game confident and fearless and it shows. They play with a lot of heart and compassion.”

The support of the men’s basketball team ranged from students, to student athletes, faculty and staff, alumni and the community of Maryville among others.

“After Ryan hit that buzzer beater, it was unbelievable,” Sillman said. “The energy in that building was nothing that I have ever felt before. What I think Coach McCollum has done for the men’s team is made those boys feel at home and accomplished. He really sets the bar high for anyone in that program and makes those boys work hard for what they want."

Coach Ben McCollum entered his 10th year of coaching for Northwest in the 2018-2019 season. Entering the season, the team was pegged to have a rebuilding season. They lost four of their starters: Justin Pitts, Xavier Kurth, Chris-Ebou Ndow and Brett Dougherty from the previous season.

“The whole pre-season was just a fight to make sure that we proved everybody wrong,” McCollum said. “Who we really are is when you can lose a guy that plays for 40 minutes, you can lose MVP of your league, close to receiving national player of the year, and still in a dog fight get the win and that’s who we are as a team.”

The team finished with a perfect season, going 38-0. Only the fifth undefeated national championship team in history. The team went 100-5 within the past three years. Northwest was also the first program in the 95 year history of MIAA to win six straight regular season titles in a row.

The way the program was run is that the players and coaches didn’t look at the last game of the season as the last game. The culture was going to continue and is going to build on itself. This was not the last game, the game would continue.

They battled, they competed, and they played to the best of their ability. According to coach McCollum the team worked hard this entire season and fought hard throughout the quarterfinal game hoping to win the championship game.

“He (Trevor Hudgins) just had that look like, we’re gonna win,” McCollum said.