Gohlke's Homecoming Ends Panthers' Home Winning Streak

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Jack Gohlke’s return to the Milwaukee area started slowly. The Pewaukee native missed three of his first four field goal attempts for the visiting Oakland Grizzlies as his team trailed Milwaukee by double-digits in the first half.  

But the sixth-year sharpshooter, a transfer from Division II Hillsdale College (MI), ensured that his large local contingent (and oversized cardboard cutout of his head) behind the Oakland bench would not leave disappointed in his first, and likely only, DI appearance back home. 

Gohlke—who entered the afternoon with 179 three-point attempts to just four field goals taken inside the arc—ended the day with 18 shot attempts (all behind the arc) and a career-high 27 points as the visitors left the home crowd stunned in a 91-87 double-overtime victory for the Grizzlies. 

Punch and Counter Punch 

UWM (10-11, 5-5 in Horizon League) came into Saturday’s game undefeated at home in conference play and winners of five straight at Panther Arena. They faced an Oakland (13-9, 9-3) team that fell out of first place after a road defeat to Green Bay two days earlier. 

The Grizzlies pounced first, scoring 10 of the game’s first 12 points. The Panthers offered a strong response, holding Oakland to just four points over the next eight minutes and change. 

B.J. Freeman, the team’s leading scorer, assisted on five buckets in this span as UWM turned an eight-point deficit into an 11-point lead. Oakland head coach Greg Kampe assailed his team throughout the media timeouts, and the visitors responded. 

While the shots were not falling for Oakland, the team turned to offensive rebounds as an alternate source of scoring against a Panther team that came into the game ranked 335th in the country in defensive rebound percentage. 

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The Grizzlies grabbed nearly half of their misses in the first half, with Gohlke hitting a pair of threes on extended possessions as Oakland carried a one-point advantage into the intermission. 

The visitors continued their ascent in the second period and seemed poised to pull away—with their lead growing to eight points within the first eight minutes. Milwaukee forward Faizon Fields did not allow that to happen.  

With Panthers forward Danny Duffy out with a broken finger, Fields played a season-high 43 minutes and was a menace on the glass. The Old Dominion transfer grabbed seven offensive boards and scored 12 points in the second half as he tried to will the Panthers to victory. 

“I wanted to win more than anything in the world,” a despondent Fields said after the game. “Every time I saw a shot, I wanted the ball more than anything. I gave maximum effort to try and go get the rebound and get my team an extra possession so we could come out on top.” 

Gohlke Keeps Firing  

After Fields hit a pair of free throws with 7:23 left in the second half, neither squad led by more than one score until late in the second overtime. Milwaukee led with less than a minute remaining in regulation, only for Gohlke to hit the first of what became a trio of clutch three-pointers. 

With his Grizzlies trailing again late in overtime, the graduate student hit another three to send the contest to a second overtime period. In the second OT, Gohlke’s make from behind the arc gave the visitors a four-point lead with 1:38—an advantage they did not relinquish. 

Tough Night For the Top Scorer 

Known primarily as a scorer, UWM junior B.J. Freeman has become more of a playmaker this season as opponents keyed in on him offensively. The team entered the Oakland contest with a 5-1 record in conference play in games where Freeman had at least four assists.  

He continued his production as a passer, totaling a career-high nine assists and just two turnovers. But Oakland’s aggressive defensive game plan took the Panthers’ star out of the game as a scorer. Freeman finished 3-13 from the field. His seven points were a season low. 

Coach Lundy summarized Freeman’s tough outing, saying, “Tonight was frustrating for B.J. because Oakland is going to double him whenever he comes off a ball screen. [When] he’d catch it, the first bounce, the closest guy came and doubled him, so it is pretty hard to score points when that’s their game plan. He got extremely frustrated with it because he does want to score, and he identifies himself as a scorer.” 

Frustrated is the ideal descriptor for a Panther team that seemingly found its footing after a slow start—winning five of six games starting in late December—but has now dropped three of its last four contests.  

After a double-OT defeat that Coach Lundy described as “heartbreaking,” UWM will look to learn from this defeat and build more consistency in the second half of Horizon League play.