Young committed to the Flyers and reached the NCAA tournament with them in 2000. That year, No. 11 seed Dayton lost 62-61 to No. 6 seed Purdue in the first round in Salt Lake City, Utah, but ended a March Madness drought that began after an appearance in 1990 in coach Jim O’Brien’s first season.
“This is why we came here,” Young told Dayton Daily News columnist Tom Archdeacon on Selection Sunday in 2000. “This is why you play college basketball.”
Young then said he didn’t need the booklet anymore.
“I can look straight in the mirror myself and see a guy going to the NCAA tournament,” he said.
Dayton made the 11th of 18 NCAA tournament appearances in 2000. It has a record of 19-20 in the tournament. It hopes to play in the event for the 19th time in 2024. With Selection Sunday one week away, here’s a look back at the best and worst of Dayton’s NCAA tournament history:
Best performance in 20th century: Don May made 16 of 22 shots, including 13 in a row at one point, on March 24, 1967, against North Carolina. Considering the stakes — this was the national semifinals — it has to be considered the greatest performance by a Flyer in the tournament. He still ranks tied for sixth in Final Four history for made field goals in a game.
May, a 6-foot-4 forward from Belmont High School in Dayton, also grabbed 15 rebounds. He played 39 of 40 minutes.
“I was able to hit the outside shot,” May said after the game. “It gave me more confidence.”
May missed his first shot and then made 13 straight. North Carolina coach Dean Smith called May the best player his team faced all season.
“We were trying to keep May from getting the ball,” Smith said, “but they kept making good passes to him. He moves very well getting free to take the passes. Our scouting reports did not reveal he was such a good outside shooter.”
May played the game with an Immaculate Conception medal tucked into the waistband of his shorts.
“It’s going to stay right there for the championship game,” he said.
May ranks second in UD history with 1,980 points.
Best performance in 21st century: Chris Wright had 27 points and 10 rebounds as No. 11 seed Dayton beat No. 6 West Virginia 68-60 in the first round on March 20, 2009, in Minneapolis. He made 10 of 16 field goals, including his only 3-point attempt, and 6 of 7 free throws.
Dayton won its first NCAA tournament game in 19 years thanks to Wright, a 6-8 forward from Trotwood then in his sophomore season.
Here’s what Doug Harris wrote about Wright’s performance in the Dayton Daily News:
Chris Wright had to stifle a grin while standing at the free-throw line at the Metrodome on Friday, March 20, when he heard someone from the Dayton cheering section address him as Superman.
It was teammate Mickey Perry’s mother, Laveller Rodgers, who has been calling the Flyers’ star that since he soared to a gravity-defying dunk over a Marquette player earlier this season.
”That’s the first time I ever heard it,” Wright said. “She always says she’s been yelling that, but I guess this place is so big, you hear all types of echoes. I heard, ‘Put it in, Superman.’ I knew it was her. I was kind of laughing in my mind, but I knew I had to focus and make the free throws.”
The sophomore forward didn’t fight crime or save the planet from spinning off its axis, but he put on a performance worthy of that moniker.”
As of late February, Wright ranked 15th in school history with 1,601 points.
Highest points total: Roosevelt Chapman scored 41 points on 13-of-22 shooting on March 17, 1984, in a 89-84 second-round victory against Oklahoma in Salt Lake City, Utah. He made 15 of 19 free throws and also grabbed eight rebounds.
“Rosey went around Oklahoma’s big men,” Gary Nuhn wrote in the Dayton Daily News. “Rosey went through Oklahoma’s big men. Rosey went over Oklahoma’s big men. Rosey went under Oklahoma’s big men. It was a show of all shows.”
“We knew Chapman was a good player,” Oklahoma coach Billy Tubbs said.
“He’s a great player,” Oklahoma star Wayman Tisdale said. “I always knew he was great. I’ve heard of Roosevelt before. He just wouldn’t miss anything. He was so quick, he just went right around our big men.”
Chapman, a 6-4 forward from Brooklyn, N.Y., who remains Dayton’s all-time leading scorer with 2,233 points, played all 40 minutes against Oklahoma. He also played all 40 minutes in the first round against LSU and scored 29 points in a 74-66 victory.
“He’s better than even he knows,” teammate Sedric Toney said. “I’d hate to guard Chap for a whole game because he never does the same thing. I mean, how can you check him if he never does the same thing? And he can handle the rock, too. You have to double-team him. You just have to.”
Most rebounds: May grabbed 20 rebounds in a 69-67 victory against Western Kentucky in the first round on March 11, 1967, at Memorial Coliseum in Lexington, Ky. He also scored 26 points in the game.
Dayton won this game when Bobby Joe Hooper made a 20-foot jump shot with four seconds remaining. He scored nine points. Rudy Waterman scored 16 points off the bench and made a number of big shots as Dayton rallied from a 12-point deficit in the second half.
May ranks second in UD history with 1,301 rebounds. He averaged 14.5 in 90 games. He grabbed 82 rebounds in five NCAA tournament games in 1967. That’s the 10th highest total in NCAA tournament history.
Most assists: Negele Knight, a 6-1 guard who ranks eighth in school history with 1,801 points, had 10 assists in a 86-84 loss to Arkansas in the second round in 1990 at the Frank Erwin Center in Austin, Texas.
Arkansas won when Todd Day missed a 4-foot jump shot with seven seconds remaining but grabbed the rebound and scored.
Knight scored 16 points on 3-of-12 shooting in his final college game.
“Once I passed the ball,” Knight said, “they wouldn’t let me get it back. We were a little uncomfortable operating like that. They (his teammates) were used to me running the game. I became one of the passengers instead of the driver.”
Best 3-point shooting performance: Darrell Davis, then a sophomore guard, made 5 of 7 3-pointers in a 72-66 loss to Oklahoma in the third round on March 22, 2015, at Nationwide Arena in Columbus.
After hitting 2 of 3 3-pointers in two nights earlier in a victory against Providence, Davis made his first four 3-pointers Sunday night against Oklahoma. He later added a fifth to tie his career high. He scored 15 points.
”I can enjoy it, but it’s not what I want to settle for,” Davis said. “We went into that game intending to get to the Sweet 16. Unfortunately we didn’t get to that level. That just means I’m going to work my butt off in the offseason.”
Davis, a 6-4 guard from Detroit, ranks ninth in school history in career 3-pointers made (191 of 507, 37.7). He ranks 50th in scoring (1,008).
The only other Flyer to make five 3-pointers in a NCAA tournament game is Ramod Marshall. He made 5 of 10 in an 84-71 loss to Tulsa in the first round on March 20, 2003, in Spokane.
Best performance in a single tournament: Henry “Hank” Finkel, a 6-11 center from Union City, N.J., scored 122 points in three tournament games in 1966. He had 25 in the first round in a 58-51 victory against Miami University in Kent, Ohio. Then he scored 36 in an 86-79 loss to Kentucky in the second round in Iowa City, Iowa. In a consolation gamne, he scored 31 in an 82-68 loss to Western Kentucky.
Here’s what Jim Zoffkie, of the Journal Herald, wrote about Finkel’s last game as a Flyer on March 14, 1966.
Hank Finkel ambled toward the University of Dayton basketball team’s bench, the appreciative applause of 13,000 people ringing in his ears.
After 1,106 rebounds and a school record 1,968 points, the seven-foot center had played his final Flyer game,
Finkel finished his brilliant career with a 31-point and 18-rebound performance against Western Kentucky in a Mideast regional consolation game Saturday at Iowa City.
The tallest Flyer of them all had just fouled out with 1:47 remaining in a game Dayton was to lose 82-68.
Dayton coach Don Donoher clutched Finkel’s right hand firmly and escorted him to the bench.
“I really didn’t think about it being my last game until coach came up to me and shook my hand,” Finkel said afterwards in the UD locker room. “He shook my hand for the last time as a ballplayer.”
Hank Finkel has not been known as an emotional man during his flourishing three years with the Flyers. But he displayed emotion saying those words.
Finkel played in six NCAA tournament games total in 1965 and 1966. He averaged 27.6 points. That’s the ninth-best average in tournament history.
Most lopsided victory: In its first NCAA tournament appearance, Dayton beat Princeton 77-61 on March 22, 1952, in the East Regional third-place game at Chicago Stadium.
Even in 1952, the third-place game wasn’t considered important. Joe Burns, of the Dayton Daily News, described the game as “strictly anti-climatic” and a “lackluster conclusion” to the season.
Don “Monk” Meineke led the Flyers with 26 points in his final college game. Dayton closed the season with a record of 28-5. That was then the winningest season in school history, and the record wasn’t broken until the Flyers finished 29-2 in the 2019-20 season.
That’s one of four games Dayton has won by double digits in the tournament. It beat North Carolina by 14 points in 1967. It beat Providence 66-53 in the second round 2015 in Columbus. It beat Stanford 82-72 in the Sweet 16 in 2014 in Memphis.
Most lopsided loss: Dayton lost 98-71 to Michigan in the second round on March 12, 1965, at Memorial Coliseum in Lexington, Ky.
The Flyers faced the nation’s No. 1 team and one of the tallest teams in the country in the second round. Every Michigan starter stood at least 6-foot-4.
Michigan led 44-27 at halftime and rolled to a victory. Hank Finkel scored 22 points for Dayton. Bill Buntin led Michigan with 26.
“We thought going in we’d have to have one of our best performances,” Donoher said. “But we didn’t get a good first half. The game was over at halftime.”
Longest game: On March 11, 1974, Dayton lost 111-100 to UCLA in triple overtime in the second round in Tuscon, Ariz. It’s one of five triple-overtime games in tournament history. Dayton almost ended UCLA’s run of seven straight NCAA championships. Instead, UCLA lost 80-74 to North Carolina State in double overtime in the national semifinals.
There has been only one four-overtime game: Canisius 79, North Carolina State 78 in the first round in 1956.
Here’s what Gary Nuhn wrote in the Dayton Daily News after the game:
It was a time for tears, but Dayton’s Flyers were too exhausted, to depressed, too numb to cry.
The full impact of what they had done, of what they had failed to do, had not yet enveloped them.
They took mighty UCLA, the kings of college basketball, through one overtime, through two overtimes, through three overtimes before finally crumbling. UCLA won, 111-100, in the semifinals of the Far West regional, but not before the Flyers did everything ... repeat, everything ... but win.
Dayton had a three-point lead and owned the ball with a minute-and-a-half to go in regulation and couldn’t hold on.
The Flyers had the last shot of regulation and wouldn’t fall.
The Flyers had the ball at the end of the second overtime and couldn’t get off a shot.
And finally, UCLA took control. Finally. Dayton’s fairy tale ended. Finally, the whole damn world exploded.
“I don’t know what to think,” said UD forward Mike Sylvester, who scored 36 points in his most outstanding game ever. “I can’t describe how I feel. I can’t decide whether to be furious or satisfied or what.”
“The only time to show tears,” said Donald Smith, “is when you know you didn’t play your hardest. We played our hardest. But when that third overtime started, we just didn’t have anything left. It was all out of us.”
Closest loss: Dayton’s only one-point loss in the tournament came on March 16, 2000: 62-61 to Purdue. Here’s what Bucky Albers wrote in the Dayton Daily News about the game:
The University of Dayton Flyers picked the worst time to do their poorest long-range shooting of the year.
As a result, they dropped a 62-61 decision to Purdue on Thursday afternoon and made an early exit from the NCAA Tournament in a rugged, physical battle at the McKale Center at the University of Arizona.
Capitalizing on four straight Purdue turnovers, the Flyers grabbed a 58-55 lead with 2:54 remaining on a steal and basket by Brooks Hall, but they couldn’t hold it.
Purdue’s Jaraan Cornell and Brian Cardinal made back-to-back 3-point shots to put the Boilermakers ahead to stay.
”The game was kind of a microcosm of our season,” UD coach Oliver Purnell said. “We didn’t always shoot it well. We shot it OK from the field, we didn’t shoot it well from three. Yet our defense and rebounding kept us in there. We turned them over (19 times) with a tough defense and got into a position to win.”
Credit: David Jablonski/Staff
Credit: David Jablonski/Staff
Best ending: No. 11 seed Dayton beat No. 6 Ohio State 60-59 in the first round on March 20, 2014, in Buffalo.
Vee Sanford, a senior guard from Lexington, Ky., drove the right side of the lane and scoring on a bank shot over the head of Ohio State star Aaron Craft with 3.8 seconds remaining. Craft dribbled to the other end and missed a short jump shot in between four Dayton defenders as the final buzzer sounded.
”I just thank God and thank Coach (Archie Miller) for trusting me,” Sanford said. “We’ve probably drawn up a play like that and I messed it up previously, but he just kept his trust in me and I’m just thankful that the shot went in.”
Biggest 3-pointer: No. 11 seed Dayton beat No. 11 seed Boise State 56-55 in the First Four at UD Arena on March 18, 2015.
Dayton guard Jordan Sibert hit a 3-pointer with 35 seconds left to give Dayton the lead for good. After Kendall Pollard missed two free throws with 14 seconds to go, Boise State had one last shot. Derrick Marks missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer.
“I just wanted to come out there and just make a shot,” Sibert said. “It was kind of difficult with four fouls trying to get into the rhythm of the game. But my teammates, they do a great job believing in me. Coach (Archie Miller), he called the play. He believed in me. When you’ve got a group of people like this around you who, no matter foul trouble, shots going in or not, they just keep telling you to shoot the ball and believe in yourself. It’s easy to go out there and catch a good rhythm and shoot it.”
Best defensive performance against Dayton: Cole Aldrich, of Kansas, blocked 10 shots against Dayton in the second round on March 22, 2009, in Minneapolis. That’s the third-highest block total in NCAA tournament history in the first three rounds. No. 11 seed Dayton lost 60-43 to No. 3 seed Kansas.
“One of our greatest strengths is attacking the basket,” Dayton’s Charles Little said. “You know, you get past the first guy and you look up and there’s a mountain in the middle of the lane. It’s hard to get a shot over (Aldrich). When I did, it wasn’t a good shot.”
Aldrich also had 13 points and 20 rebounds. He has one of the nine triple-doubles in NCAA tournament history..
Worst shooting performance: In that same loss to Kansas, Dayton made 16 of 72 shots (22.2%). That’s the fifth-worst shooting percentage in the first three rounds in NCAA tournament history.
“We couldn’t make shots — credit them for that,” Dayton coach Brian Gregory said. “Obviously, I’m disappointed for the season to come to an end because it’s been such a great group to be around. ... I’m proud of these guys.”
Best free-throw shooting performance: Dayton made 17 of 17 free throws in a 51-49 loss to Villanova in the first round on March 15, 1985, at UD Arena. That’s tied for the four-best percentage (minimum 15 attempts) in tournament history. It also was then (and still is) a school record.
Damon Goodwin made 8 of 8 free throws. Larry Schellenberg made 6 of 6. Sedric Toney made 2 of 2. Dave Colbert made his only attempt. Dayton shot 71.3% at the line that season.
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