Winona Lakes, Indiana –– The University of Northwestern Eagles men's basketball team captured its second NCCAA national championship on Saturday afternoon. The Eagles defeated the Ottawa University Arizona Spirit 82-75 to claim the title. Kyle Kaemingk (Woodbury, Minn./New Life Academy) was named the Tournament's Most Outstanding Player, and Noah Alm (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake) and Kaemingk were named members of the All-Tournament team.

The men came into the title game riding an eight-game winning streak. They had relied on late-game magic in the previous three tournament games, and they hoped to make it a little easier on themselves in the title game. 

Henry Fahnbulleh (Maple Grove, Minn./Maple Grove) got the Eagles to the tournament with a fadeaway buzzer-beating three that became the number one play on SportsCenter to defeat Trinity Christian College, 69-68. The men followed that up with a two-point, 67-65, win over the #5 seed Lancaster Bible College in the first round of the NCCAA tournament on Wednesday night. The Eagles then advanced to the national title game after they defeated the #1 seeded Grace College, 79-76, as more late-game heroics kept the Eagles dancing.

The Eagles came into the game riding high off of the previous three games' results, and they knew that they needed to play even better to knock off Ottawa University Arizona. In only the Spirit's fourth season as an NAIA basketball team, they had managed to reach the championship game after a couple of convincing wins over Southwestern Christian and Alice Lloyd.

Owen Boerema (Litchfield, Minn./Litchfield) got the game, and his career day started with a triple. The sophomore picked a great game to drop a new career-high of 15 points in his 26 minutes of work. The two teams battled back and forth throughout the first half as they got acclimated to the pressure that comes with playing in a national title game. 

In contrast to the semifinal against Grace, though, the Eagles maintained a lead, even if it was slim, for 17 and a half minutes of the half, rather than playing from behind. The largest lead of the half for the Eagles came on Noah Alm's (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake) two with 2:34 left to make it 39-29, but the Spirit closed the half on a 7-2 run to make it 41-36, heading into intermission.

After the break, the Eagles came out on a mission to add its second NCCAA championship banner to the Ericksen Center wall. Northwestern scored the first four points before the Spirit, led by Kam Malbrough, hit a three. The two squads then exchanged buckets as Malbrough scored the Spirit's first eleven points of the half. That cut the Eagle lead to 49-47 with a little under 16 minutes to play before Ottawa took a 50-49 lead with fourteen to play.

Johnny Erickson (Minneapolis, Minn./Hope Academy) and Caleb Waldeck (Newhall, Calif./Hart High) both hit twos as the two guards gave the Eagles a 53-52 lead with 12:42 to play. After Waldeck's two, the Eagles never trailed again. Cole Elrod (Elk River, Minn./Spectrum) gave the Eagles a four-point cushion to ignite the Eagle bench with his first three of the season.

Ottawa kept fighting, and the lead remained between one and four until Waldeck hit a three with eight minutes to go to extend the lead to 63-57. Kaemingk and Henry Fahnbulleh (Maple Grove, Minn./Maple Grove) both hit twos, sandwiched between a Spirit three, to make it a seven-point game, 67-60, with six to play for a national championship.

Boerema added another two to bring the lead back out to eight with a little less than five minutes left as the Spirit kept the pressure on the Eagles down the stretch. Noah Alm (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake), the All-Tournament team member, decided to take matters into his own hands by pulling up from downtown to swish another three. That three gave the Eagles its first double-digit lead of the game at 72-62 with 3:41 to go.

The bench really started to feel that a National Championship was coming when Fahnbulleh, the hero from all March long, did it again by hitting a three to make it 75-64 less than a minute later. Northwestern managed to keep Ottawa at arms-distance for most of the last three minutes until two late turnovers almost brought the Spirit back into the game. 

Ottawa hit a quick two after the first and then had an open look from three clang off the rim, which would have made it a four-point game with 25 seconds to go. Instead, Noah Alm (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake) grabbed the rebound and took the Eagles' seven-point to the free-throw line. The senior, who will be returning for next season, hit both free-throws, and the party was on as the Eagles won the national championship 82-75. Northwestern led for 36:40 seconds of the 40-minute contest as they won the championship.

The five starters led the Eagles as they all played the majority of the minutes. Henry Fahnbulleh (Maple Grove, Minn./Maple Grove) led the Eagles with 17 points, Boerema had 15, Alm dropped 13, including 3-5 from downtown, Waldeck had 11, and Kaemingk had 10 as all five starters ended in double figures. In his final game of an excellent career for the Eagles, Johnny Erickson (Minneapolis, Minn./Hope Academy) scored six on 3-5 shooting in 11 minutes off the bench. 

Northwestern finished this highly unusual and memorable season with a 17-3 record and won the UMAC Tournament and the NCCAA National Championship. Noah Alm (Forest Lake, Minn./Forest Lake) and Kyle Kaemingk (Woodbury, Minn./New Life Academy) led the Eagles as they scored 339 and 331 points, respectively. Both men will be back next season and will use their extra year of eligibility to hopefully get the Eagles back to the NCAA tournament. The freshmen Henry Fahnbulleh (Maple Grove, Minn./Maple Grove) had his coming out party in the NCCAA tournament, and he hopes to continue his success to propel the Eagles to new heights next year.

The Eagles bid farewell to two seniors, Johnny Erickson (Minneapolis, Minn./Hope Academy) and Jacob Martin (Mahtomedi, Minn./Mahtomedi High School), after the game. The team sent them out on top with Northwestern's first national championship since the men's basketball team last did it in 2010 in its last appearance in the NCCAA tournament.

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