NIT 10: The Last Meeting

Introduction: Lifetime of memories made on the eve of Valparaiso's 2016 NIT title game

The sun had set in Midtown Manhattan, but the lights never dim in Times Square.

High above the hustle and bustle of New York City, nestled inside the Marriott Marquis on the corner of 46th Street and Seventh Avenue, members of the Valparaiso men’s basketball program made their way into a meeting room they had called home for the last several days.

Tomorrow, the winningest team in school history would play its final game together, the 2016 NIT title game against George Washington. Tonight, however, was one last opportunity to spend time with one another.

Alec Peters (Valparaiso junior forward): Usually what we’d do the night before a game is we’d get locked in. We’d get team dinner, maybe have another video session to go over the scouting report, and then guys would get their rest.

Luke Simons (Valparaiso director of basketball operations): I can still see where I was in the room. It was a room that was a lot longer than it was wide. We moved all of the tables down to one end. We didn’t eat in there, it was just a room filled with chairs. It was just the guys.

Jacob Schoon (Valparaiso student manager): I’m sitting in that room right now in my head. It’s been 10 years, but I can still see where everybody is sitting.

E. Victor Nickerson (Valparaiso senior guard): That night was more of a night to remember everything that happened in the last couple years. Everything was so serious and focused for the last two years. It was just at the point where we had one more game for the seniors. Let’s just enjoy it and make the most of it.

Alec Peters: This was kind of genius of Bryce. He called a team meeting and we just sat there and we took it all in. This is our last game tomorrow, win or lose, let’s just enjoy being around each other as a team. Look where we’re at. Look at the situation we’re in.

Luke Gore (Valparaiso assistant coach): I remember that night more than I remember anything else.

Luke Simons: There was nothing else to talk about after tomorrow night. This has been a really special year. This is a special group of people. Now, who has something to say? There were a lot of memories shared.

Chandler Levingston Simon (Valparaiso sophomore forward): We had a team meeting and we already knew everything that needed to be done for the game. This wasn’t a conversation about X’s and O’s. This was something else. I don’t remember how it started.

Shane Hammink (Valparaiso junior guard): It was a pretty cool moment. We sat down in a circle and just started talking. I think I was the one that led off with the first story. I kind of thanked everybody for being there. Everyone just went around and talked.

Matt Lottich (Valparaiso assistant coach): It’s rare to have moments where coaches let down their guard and players let down their guard. I don’t mean that negatively. You look at a long season and the coaches are coaching and the players are playing. There’s a lot of high-stress moments because that’s the nature of what we do. Every now and then you get these moments where people let down their guard and you see their true personalities.

Lexus Williams (Valparaiso junior guard): When we meet up years later as brothers, we don’t talk about how we were 30-7. We talk about the memories we had in practice or the times we got cussed out in the film room. The times we went out as a team. It doesn’t even matter what happened between the lines, just about the memories you make with the guys. I couldn’t tell you who we played in the nonconference or who we beat to go to New York. I just remember how I felt and there were a lot of times I felt really good as a person. I learned a lot and it made me the person I am today.

Keith Carter (Valparaiso senior guard): I didn’t know at the time how much it would all mean to me. Looking back now, it definitely means a lot.

Luke Simons: Then Max Joseph got up.

Austin Peters (Valparaiso graduate assistant): Nobody knew what was coming.

Alec Peters: Max Joseph is an excellent impersonator, and that’s as much as I’ll say about it.

Jubril Adekoya (Valparaiso junior forward): Max used to always do all these coach impersonations throughout the year. He did it in the locker room all the time. This was the first time the coaches saw it.

Nick Davidson (Valparaiso junior guard): We would get precursors to Max impersonating the coaches. He’d try them out throughout the year. He does a great Coach Powell. We had an appetizer of it during the year. I don’t know, maybe it was the bright lights of New York, but he just rolled with it and performed. Once he started, he didn’t stop. He never broke character. He never laughed. He was Leonardo DiCaprio.

Vashil Fernandez (Valparaiso senior center): It brings me such joy. We know this is going to be our last game of the season, and for a few of us, it’s going to be our last college game ever. We’re able to be in a space where we know the seriousness of it, but still, in the midst of that, we are able to enjoy laughter with each other. We could still enjoy the moment, and we really enjoyed that moment.

Luke Simons: Max didn’t talk a whole lot, but it was obvious he had been listening and observing the entire year. He did every single coach impression and people lost it.

Chandler Levingston Simon: What people don’t know is Max didn’t really speak English when he first got to Valpo. He really only spoke around people he was comfortable with. By not speaking, he was watching everybody. He picked up on everything. He mastered how everyone did everything. He used to do AP’s jump shot. He got up there and he did the entire halftime. He did what every coach would do at halftime. The coaches were dying.

Darien Walker (Valparaiso senior guard): Max watched those coaches a lot and he had some accurate readings. We had a lot of serious moments on that team. Roger Powell was always there to keep us together with those preacher-man speeches. Max took that and gave us some comic relief.

Matt Lottich: He was phenomenal impersonating the assistant coaches, but I loved watching him have the reluctance to impersonate Coach Drew. It was so funny and it was really cool. A core memory, no doubt about it.

Austin Peters: Coach Drew was crying. He was on his knees laughing. Everybody in the room was. Wow, I haven’t thought about that in a long time.

Jacob Schoon: I don’t think I’ve ever seen Coach Drew like that before. Looking back, maybe he kind of knew this was it. Watching him while Max was going, it was a different type of joy. I saw a side of a man that I really respect and I saw that he truly cares for us, very deeply, and more than I ever thought. He was put in our lives for a reason and we were put in his for a reason. I’d never seen him have that kind of fun before.

Alec Peters: The room was filled with so much laughter. We were on the floor crying. We might have lost the game the next day, but that moment will stick with me forever. Regardless of how the weekend would have went, the memory is so special. Just sitting there and all of us just dying of laughter over some of the stuff, the stories we were telling. Some of the things we were doing in that meeting, it was better than maybe winning the NIT. If we would have won the NIT, great, but we had that time together and that’s what truly mattered.

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Over the next week, The Victory Bell will celebrate the 10-year anniversary of Valparaiso’s run to the NIT with a special series that has been in the works for the better part of a year.

The five-part oral history draws from more than two dozen interviews of Valparaiso players and coaches, university administration, opposing coaches and other individuals that were connected to the winningest season in program history.

The series begins in the summer of 2015 as Valparaiso readies for an international trip while getting the (un)expected news that a key piece was returning for the upcoming season. The second part is a behind-the-scenes look at a regular season where Valpo continually flirted with a Top 25 ranking while also suffering the occasional setback.

The third part is an in-depth look at the Horizon League tournament as top-seeded Valparaiso took on Green Bay in the semifinals. Instead of playing in Valpo, the league shifted the tournament to Detroit with the formation of Motor City Madness.

The fourth installment focuses on Valparaiso’s march through the NIT, from hosting Texas Southern, Florida State and St. Mary’s, to earning a trip to the Big Apple. The final piece is an epilogue which looks at the fallout from not only a coaching change, but a seismic shift in collegiate athletics that makes what the 2015-16 team accomplished nearly impossible to replicate in the modern era.

While this introduction article is available for free to all readers, the five-part series will only be available to paid subscribers of The Victory Bell. The cost is $7.99 per month or $79.99 for the entire year. It is through the paid support of readers that I’m able to keep the site operating and put together projects such as this one. Thank you for your support.

(Photo courtesy of Valpo Athletics)