The Basketball Tournament: Red Scare’s dream of playing at UD Arena dies in second round

One day after a dominating No. 15 seed BC Vahakni City from start to finish in an 88-44 victory in the first round of The Basketball Tournament, the No. 2 seed Red Scare fell behind early and never caught up, losing 76-69 to No. 10 seed Category 5 on Sunday at the Covelli Center.

“I just feel bad for the fans,” said Devin Oliver, a 2014 UD graduate who has played on all three Red Scare teams. “We’re going to go still have jobs this year and make money. For me especially, as I’m getting older, I just want to give something back to the Dayton fans. Especially going back to Dayton, I really wanted to try to get there, but that that’s the spirit of competition.”

The Red Scare is 5-3 in three TBT appearances. This was the first time it failed to win two games.

Category 5, which had six former Miami Hurricanes on the roster, took control with nine points in the last 69 seconds of the first quarter, building a 21-10 lead. It stretched the advantage to as many as 16 points in the second quarter. The Red Scare was fortunate to cut the deficit to single digits, 39-31, by halftime.

In the third quarter, Category 5 had an answer for every Red Scare run. After the Red Scare trimmed the deficit to 45-41 on a basket by Trey Landers, Durand Scott and Mario Kegler made 3-pointers for Category 5 to push their lead back to 10 points.

The Red Scare had one final run in the fourth quarter, getting as close as 62-60 on a 3-pointer by Darrell Davis with 7:02 to play. Then baskets by Davon Reed, who led the team with 21 points, and Zach Johnson stopped Red Scare’s momentum.

Category 5 shot 52 percent from the field and 45 percent (9 of 20) from 3-point range.

“They had five legit guards,” Red Scare coach Joey Gruden said, “and they can all attack the basket. They can all shoot. They can all score. We definitely had some matchup problems. They played well. They made a lot of tough shots. We didn’t hit the shots we were hitting yesterday.”

Trevor Thompson and Jordan Sibert, who combined for 37 points in the first game, scored nine points together in this one.

A bright spot for the Red Scare was the play of Darrell Davis. The 2018 UD graduate scored 29 points on 9-of-13 shooting.

“Darrell has been amazing,” Gruden said. “Every year, we’ve done this, he’s proven he can play with anybody in the world.”

Category 5 will play No. 6 seed Blue Collar U (Buffalo Bulls alumni) or No. 3 Zip Em Up (Xavier alumni) in the third round at 7 p.m. Tuesday. That game will air on ESPN. The winner will advance to the quarterfinals at UD Arena on July 31.

“We really wanted to get back and play in front of UD,” Gruden said. “We knew if we could, it would have been special and (the fans) would have came out. I think everyone’s just even more hurt that we’re missing out on that opportunity, but hopefully next year and in the years to come, the TBT will keep showing Dayton love because we always come out to support.”