Championships
by Donnie Bostwick
March 20, 2021
963
One Final Summary of our Championship 2021 Post Season!
First and foremost. All thanks and glory to God who was as evident this season as ever before! My boys played for an audience of One and I can hear our Father saying Well Done right now!
- We won our last eight games to give ourselves the opportunity to advance to post season. God added Chaplain Tony Siebels to our team at the beginning of that run. He was a game changer and prayer Warrior who encouraged, inspired, and became a rock for us. It was a major blessing for both of us. Him and his wife had separated, but through much of what happened with our team the last month, Tony and his wife are reuniting. I would consider saving a Marriage as a championship!
- We found ourselves back in the valley going into the conference tournament though, but God displayed His Awe and Wonder as we came out of a 10-day quarantine to hit two game winning 3’s to advance to KCAC conference championship. That included a comeback from 7 down with under 3 minutes to play vs Kansas Wesleyan and punching our final ticket to the NAIA Tournament when Kaleb Stokes for the second straight game hit a miracle 3pt shot going length of the court in 3.7 seconds with the ball leaving his hand with .1 on the clock to beat Ottawa. God’s fingerprints were all over that victory. Without that shot our season would have ended that day.
- We played a great game against Bethel College in the KCAC championship. Brooks hit a what seemed to be another game winning three with less than 5 seconds left, before losing on a very tough foul call with .2 on the clock. What seemed to be a dagger only strengthened and prepared us for the NAIA Tournament and upcoming regional. Bouncing back from a difficult to swallow loss showed my guys resolve and love for each other. It put all of our focus on God and relying on Him to help us punch out final ticket by returning to Wichita to win the first-round regional in order to reach the Sweet 16 in Kanas City. Trusting Him to help us cut down the net in Hartman Arena in Wichita proved to be a high point for our season.
- Hartman Arena in the NAIA National Tournament Opening Round became a touch of Heaven as God’s presence in that House was impossible to deny. I have never seen one of my team’s play with such anointing. We simply could not miss. Our confidence was in Christ and He became our defense as we beat two very good teams. According to the NAIA Hoops Report we were longshot underdogs in both games against both Park and USAO. They must have underestimated the power that my players had tapped into as we led both games by over 30 points. The Regional Championship Trophy and cutting the Nets down once again in Hartman Arena was a beautiful site as we prayed at center court thanking Jesus for send the Holy Spirit to empower us. We received a nice trophy validating that Championship.
- It was such a special feeling to return back to Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, the place of my first NAIA Championship in 2005 as an assistant coach. After coming to OKWU and winning the NAIA D2 championship in Branson in 2009, I returned to NAIA D1 and reached KC and the NAIA D1 Championship game again in 2013 at SAGU. In 2017 I returned to OKWU and the last three years have been awesome going to South Dakota for the NAIA D2 National Tournament. This year with the NAIA returning to one division for the first time since 1992 the challenge of reaching Kansas City and the NAIA Sweet 16 was twice as challenging with over 200 teams in the fight. If you add Covid to that mountain, the challenge was as difficult as ever to make this climb. The challenge for our team became conquerable only through faith and trust in Christ Jesus. We had a very young team and, on most nights, we were outsized, but finding His Plan and His Way became our Mission every game.
- The return to Kansas City began with a powerful encounter at the International House of Prayer (IHOP). A tradition we began at SAGU. That night at IHOP was a championship.
- Despite the Covid restrictions, we had so many special times as a group just hanging out, practicing, and eating together. On Wednesday, we were blessed with so much famous Jack’s barbecue by our sponsor, that we could not eat half of it. So, on a bitter cold Kansas City night, Chap Tony and I felt led to take the extra food we had been blessed with and bless others. We took off to downtown KC. We had seen some homeless at practice earlier in the day. After sharing food, we prayed with gentlemen we met named David, Mark, and Red. We still had some food and something inside me said to go find a grocery store and I would find someone in need of food. The first grocery store we found just happened to be a Price Chopper, which also just so happened to be our team sponsor. There we found a small Latino lady who was so excited to take the food home to her children. We got to pray with her and it became a special championship evening.
- The night was young though as late Wednesday night we won another major championship. At a little after midnight Geno my assistant coach called with awesome news about his wife Allee’s water breaking. Their baby boy decided to come Five weeks early, this miracle baby is a result of countless prayers! Geno drove home through the night through sleet and snow reaching Bartlesville at 5 am. At 7:03 am our biggest championship and miracle took place as Oaks Gray Hartman came into the world! Geno and Allee had endured struggles having children, but Oaks Gray “The OG” overcame it all.
- Thursday morning at 7:30 a.m., I was blessed to lead an FCA Coaches Zoom. Three Coaches were able to be on the zoom. My close friend Coach Delton Deal who followed me at SAGU and Coach Delano Thomas at Shawnee State. We all shared our testimonies and journeys of how God has guided us to KC this season. It was a special time. Both Coach Deal and I were truly blessed to hear Coach Delano’s story. He did not realize what FCA stood for, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, but saw the zoom invite and felt the need to join. He shared his powerful testimony. To hear it was another championship. I would live to see one of these coaches raise a banner this season. They both won their first-round games and are now in the Elite 8.
- We may have come up short on the scoreboard on Friday night, but watching one of my former players, Austin Johnson, who coaches at LCS, receive Coach of the Year before our game was yet another championship. I hope to see them advance to a Championship. To me it was a championship. After becoming a head college basketball coach, Austin was my first senior to graduate. Watching one of my players advance past me in success now coaching completes a big step in my personal journey. My favorite African Proverb, “I met a man on my journey, and He passed me on my way.” Sharing all I knew with him and watching him now take it further is such a joy, a true championship.
So, those of you that think we lost and did not win a championship this season, you need to take the blinders off and see how Jesus is always working behind and through everything. With Christ Jesus you can a championship every day of the year.