A few days before Stony Brook was set to host the America East Championship, coach Steve Pikiell heard a commotion outside his office.
In the hall, countless students were lined up to enter into a lottery, hoping to score a seat to history inside tiny Pritchard Gymnasium.
In front of Pikiell was a picture of his first game at the school, in 2005. There were eight fans in the stands, two walk-ons in his starting lineup and a broken scoreboard, the beginning of a season that saw four wins.
“I’m thinking about the people that are outside my office right now and we have a lot more people in the hallway than we did at that game,” Pikiell said. “It’s kind of symbolic of where we’ve come from. It’s great to bring March Madness to our campus.”
For the third time in school history, Stony Brook is one win away from the NCAA Tournament. On Saturday morning, the second-seeded Seawolves will host fourth-seeded Albany in the America East title game at 11:30 on ESPN2, hoping to erase the pain of the several near-misses over the past five seasons.
In 2011, the Seawolves fell in the final seconds of the title game at Boston University. In 2012, Stony Brook lost in the championship in the final minute to Vermont. Last season, Albany won the championship, defeating the top-seeded Seawolves on a last-second layup at home.
Playing Albany in the tournament for the fifth straight season, Stony Brook (23-9) enters with 15 wins in its past 18 games, including a regular-season-ending home win over the Great Danes (17-14).
“The only thing I can think about is falling short the last three years and I can’t allow that to happen again this year,” senior guard Dave Coley said. “There is no next year. This is the last chance. This is a life-changing game. Twenty, 30 years down the line you’ll be thinking about this game, whether you win or lose. The other years, I still think about those games.”
Two years ago, the Seawolves hosted the title game for the first time, but were forced to play at a still-under construction Stony Brook Arena — a building in which they never play — in order to meet a minimum-seating requirement.
With that clause no longer in place, the team knows how much the intimate, but incredibly loud, setting of Pritchard can make a difference. The building holds fewer than 2,000 people, and the Seawolves have a 37-3 record there over the past three seasons.
“The court is right on top of us, it’s going to be jam-packed. I think that gives us a huge advantage,” Coley said. “The fans, everyone here, these are the best people I’ve been around in my life.
“They already treat us like we’re the Lakers around here. To win a championship, I can’t imagine what they would feel. It would be unbelievable.”