SAN BERNARDINO—The Chico State men's basketball team won the 2017 NCAA Tournament West Regional when Malik Duffy and Isaiah Brooks were redshirting freshmen. At the time, it would have been hard for those close to the program—maybe impossible—to imagine that the Wildcats wouldn't play another NCAA Tournament West Regional game until 2022. 
 
The 20-win 2017-18 season did not result in an NCAA Tournament berth and a 2018-19 year was derailed by the Camp Fire, which devastated Butte County. The 2019-20 team, featuring nine players still on the roster, made the NCAA Tournament field. Alas, the season was canceled on the eve of the opening round. The 2020-21 season never got started.
 
The wait has been long, but the Wildcats' patience has paid off, and never more handsomely than it did Friday when the Wildcats put together a dominant second-half performance to pull away and beat Academy of Art 78-61 in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament at Coussoulis Arena on the campus of Cal State San Bernardino.
 
"I'm really happy about our competitive level," said Chico State Head Coach Greg Clink. "We've been talking all week about playing an NCAA game. We have some guys on this team that qualified two years ago but didn't get to participate, so this was a new experience for a lot of us and I was really happy with the response and how competitive we were."
 
The No. 3 seed Wildcats, ranked No. 15 in the nation, will take on tournament host Cal State San Bernardino (the No. 2 seed and ranked No. 8 in the nation) in Saturday's first regional semifinal game at 5 p.m. In the other semifinal, No. 8 seed Alaska will take on No. 5 seed Azusa Pacific at 7:30 p.m. The regional championship game is scheduled for Monday at 7 p.m. The winner of the regional championship advances to the NCAA Championship Tournament Elite Eight March 22–26 in Evansville, Indiana.
 
The fifth- and sixth-year seniors on the Chico State roster soak up most of the headlines. And deservedly so. Malik Duffy, Isaiah Brooks, and Kevin Warren could have all walked across the stage, graduated, and moved on with their lives after the 2020 NCAA Tournament rug was pulled out from under them and the 2020-21 season was canceled as well. Instead, they stuck around to form the core of one of the most successful squads in Wildcats history—all three earning First Team All-Conference honors. But they are only three of many. Friday, it was sophomore forward Kelvin Wright Jr who led the way with a career-high 18 points on 8-of-10 shooting. He also grabbed eight rebounds and tacked on two steals, two assists, and a blocked shot. 
 
"I thought Kelvin Wright did a phenomenal job on both ends of the floor," Clink said. "We have been prepping him and putting pressure on him all week and I thought he did a great job responding."
 
While Wright was a consistently dominating presence, the rest of the Wildcats took turns turning the game in Chico State's favor. Their first-half rebounding woes cost them an early lead. They gave up 10 second-chance points before intermission and were outrebounded 19-14 in the half. But Isaiah Brooks brought them back with 10 first-half points. His triple with 1:08 left before intermission gave the Wildcats their fourth lead of the day, and Kevin Warren's buzzer-beating tip-in made it 36-32. Brooks finished with 12 points and a game-high seven assists. 
 
Kevin Warren scored seven straight points during the game's decisive 9-0 run that stretched the Wildcats' lead to 74-59. He finished with 13 points. Prior to that push, it was true freshman Evan Oliver, who grew up just down the road from Cal State San Bernardino, who put together his most impactful stint of minutes of his collegiate career yet. Oliver hit a 3-pointer and then turned a steal into a layup to spark a 9-0 run that put the Wildcats in control of the game early in the second half. 
 
In between, Malik Duffy chipped away at a double-double. Named the West Region Player of the Year on Saturday morning, Duffy finished with 15 points and 11 rebounds. 
 
"Me and Malik know when we're on the floor at the same time we're very hard to guard with the way he stretches the floor and the way I attack the rim and do what I do best," Wright Jr. said. "I enjoy playing alongside him."
 
The Wildcats improved to 20-4 and have now won 20 games or more in seven of the past eight seasons. They've won four straight NCAA Tournament West Regional contests, along with seven of their last nine. 
 
Academy of Art's season ended at 20-12.