March Madness: St. John's first opponent . . . what to know about the Omaha Mavericks
The Omaha team celebrates winning the 2025 Summit League Tournament against St. Thomas on Sunday, March 9, 2025, in Sioux Falls, S.D. Credit: AP
St. John’s hopes to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament, and it all starts this week.
The second-seeded Red Storm (30-4) and No. 15 Omaha (22-12) will meet in the first round in the West Region at 9:45 p.m. Thursday at Amica Mutual Pavilion in Providence, Rhode Island.
The Mavericks won the Summit League Tournament to receive the conference’s automatic bid to The Big Dance. No. 15 seeds are 11-145 against No. 2 seeds, though three of those wins have come in the previous four tournaments.
Here’s the rundown on Omaha, which is a massive underdog against St. John’s.
TOURNAMENT HISTORY
Omaha is making its first appearance in the NCAA Division I Tournament. The Mavericks made the jump from Division II to Division I ahead of the 2011-12 season, and they were ineligible for the NCAA Tournament during their first four Division I seasons as part of the transition. Omaha made 12 appearances in the NCAA Division II Tournament, reaching the Sweet 16 in 1975 and 1982.
Omaha has appeared in two other Division I postseason tournaments: the 2014 CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT) and the 2016 College Basketball Invitational (CBI).
THE COACH
Chris Crutchfield, 56, is in his third season leading Omaha, and the progress has been palpable. The Mavericks went 9-23 in his first season and improved to 15-18 last year before this season’s breakthrough. Crutchfield played basketball and football at Omaha.
“It has been a full circle, to be honest with you,” Crutchfield told CBS Sports Network on Sunday night.
Crutchfield previously was the head coach at Tyler Junior College (1999-2001) and Division II program East Central (2020-21). He had assistant coaching stints at Oklahoma (2011-19), Arkansas (2019-20) and Oregon (2021-22) among other stops.
TOP SCORER
Summit League Player of the Year Marquel Sutton, a 6-9 senior forward, is averaging 19.1 points and 8.0 rebounds and shooting 48.4% from the field. He can stretch the floor and takes 2.8 three-pointers per game, though he makes only 29.2% of them. Sutton had 21 20-point games and six 25-point games.
Sutton scored a season-high 36 points against South Dakota. He was limited in Omaha’s two games against power-conference competition this season, scoring a season-low three points against Iowa State and 13 points against Minnesota. Sutton, who has been at Omaha for three seasons, played his freshman season at the JUCO level for Connors State College in Oklahoma.
THE PERIMETER
The recipe for a mammoth upset often starts and ends with three-point shooting. Omaha is the nation’s 52nd-best three-point shooting team at 36.7% and shot a Summit League-best 40.2% from outside the arc in conference play. The Mavericks have four players who shoot at least 36% from deep: JJ White (43.9%), Tony Osburn (40.4%), Kamryn Thomas (37.8%) and Ja’Sean Glover (36.5%). White has five games with at least four three-pointers and Osburn has seven, including a conference tournament semifinal win over South Dakota in which he made eight treys.
BIGGEST WINS
In its Division I history, Omaha has never beaten a team that finished the season ranked in the top 70 at kenpom.com. The Mavericks have only four all-time wins against KenPom top-100 teams.
Omaha has beaten three power-conference programs, all in road games, since it moved to D-I: Marquette (Nov. 22, 2014), Iowa (Dec. 3, 2016) and Washington State (Nov. 21, 2019). The best team that Omaha has beaten this season is conference foe St. Thomas, the No. 127 team in the KenPom ratings, which it defeated at home on Jan. 23 and in the Summit League Tournament final on March 9.
THE VIRAL SENSATION
After every win, Omaha destroys a trash can in the locker room. Yes, you read that correctly.
The tradition started before a home win over Cal Poly on Dec. 21, when the Mavericks were 4-9. They won their next nine games and have lost only three games since. The stunt became so popular that Omaha held a “Bring Your Own Garbage Can” promotion night in February in which fans were able to bring garbage cans to use as popcorn containers.
“I had a lot of fun with it,” Crutchfield told CBS Sports Network. “Early on, when we got to about maybe six or seven games, I went to our assistant coach, Kyan Brown, and asked him, like, ‘Do we want to put this thing to sleep?’ And then our administration got a hold of it, and next thing you know, there’s a popcorn promotion and we couldn’t stop it from there out.”
THE ROAD AHEAD
The winner of Thursday’s game will meet either No. 7 Kansas or No. 10 Arkansas in the second round Saturday. St. John’s coach Rick Pitino, Kansas coach Bill Self and Arkansas coach John Calipari are Naismith Hall of Famers. Pitino has a lengthy coaching history against Calipari, both of whom coached at Kentucky, dating to 1991. Pitino and Self have faced off only once, a Kansas win over Pitino’s Iona team in November 2021.
Ben Dickson joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.
