The Wright State Raiders will represent the Horizon League in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2022 after taking down Detroit Mercy 66-63 to win the 2026 Barbasol Horizon League Men’s Basketball Championship.
Coming off a 103-point semifinal performance, the championship game was far from a repeat performance for the Raiders, but they did just enough to finish the job and punch their ticket to the Big Dance.
Like the first two meetings between the teams, Tuesday’s championship got off to
a slow start, with neither team cracking 30 in the first period. It was a bit of a rock fight in the early going, but Wright State extended the lead to nine at 25-16 with just under six to play in the half. Detroit Mercy responded, however, with a 13-1 run of its own to close with half, with its senior leader Orlando Lovejoy scoring nine of the points, including a layup in the closing seconds to put the Titans up 29-26 at the break.
Michael Imariagbe opened the scoring in the second half with Wright State’s first field goal since just under the six-minute mark in the first half, but it was once again the Detroit Mercy which went on a run, rattling off the next 10 points to open a 39-28 lead early in the half. TJ Nadeau scored all 10 points in the run as part of his big 21-point performance to complement Lovejoy’s 26. The Titans were able to withstand Raider runs and held a double-digit lead as late as the nine-minute mark, but then, the regular-season champs found their footing.
In the next 3:30 or so of gametime, TJ Burch, the league’s defensive player of the year, took over offensively, scoring eight of his team-high 19 points to cut the lead to 54-50 with about 5:30 to play. After an Imariagbe layup and two free throws from Lovejoy and four from Wright State’s freshman forward Kellen Pickett, the game was knotted up at 56.
In the closing minutes, Logan Woods stole the show for the Raiders. The junior guard, who averaged just over five points on the season, knocked down two 3-pointers to give Wright State a six-point lead with about a minute to play, putting Detroit Mercy into scramble mode.
In desperation mode, a Lovejoy layup and Nadeau contested corner three brought the Titans within two with under 10 seconds to play. Forced to foul, Detroit Mercy sent the freshman Michael Cooper to the line with a chance to ice the game, but the freshman missed both, opening the door for a chance to tie or take the lead for the Titans.
After Cooper missed the pair, his fellow freshman picked up the slack. As the veteran Lovejoy drove looking for the tie, the freshman Pickett made the play of the night, blocking his fourth shot of the night and sending the Raiders to the Big Dance.
Pickett was exceptional all evening. He finished with 17 points, seven rebounds, three assists and two steals alongside the four blocks. Imariagbe added 12 points and seven rebounds of his own for additional frontcourt support. Most importantly, Wright State out-rebounded Detroit Mercy for the first time all season.
For the Titans, a monumental season comes to a close in heart-breaking fashion, but there is no doubt plenty of encouraging signs to take from Mark Montgomery’s second season. Two years ago, Detroit Mercy won one game. Last season, it won just eight. This season, it earned the No. 3 seed in the league tournament and played for a trip to the NCAA Tournament.
Now, the Raiders will head back to Ohio and wait for Selection Sunday to figure out where it will be headed for the NCAA Tournament. It is pretty firmly on the 14-line in most projections, but with the number of regular-season champions falling in conference tournaments, there is potential for movement on that front.
