Alec Peters planned to challenge his teammates. But even more, in the aftermath of Valparaiso’s 78-66 Horizon League loss to Oakland on Friday night at the Athletics-Recreation Center, he vowed to challenge himself.
“I take a lot of the blame,” the senior star said. “There were a couple of rebounds in there that I should’ve come up with up, I turned the ball over late, I had a shot blocked late.
“It’s mistakes I can’t afford to make and it’s mistakes I will not make again. This team can’t afford mistakes like that. This is going to hurt, but sometimes a little hurt is good.”
By taking the early season showdown on the road, the Grizzlies (13-3, 3-0) gained the upper hand in the conference race. Green Bay (9-6, 3-0) is the only other undefeated team.
Oakland coach Greg Kampe cautioned against looking too far ahead, but also savored the win.
“It puts an exclamation point next to our name to everybody in the league because nobody in this league in the last five years has come into Valpo and won by double digits,” Kampe said. “In all three of our league wins, we’ve had a double-digit lead. If I’m another coach, I’m saying, ‘Wow, Oakland must be pretty good, we have to spend a little more time on them.'”
The Crusaders (11-4, 1-1) dropped to 11-3 all-time at the ARC against Oakland, which notched its first win at the venue since joining the league in 2013-14. Valparaiso suffered its worst home conference loss since a 62-45 setback to Wright State on Jan. 10, 2014.
The Grizzlies never trailed against the Crusaders, leading by as many as 15 points.
“You have a game like this, your home court, big-time game, national TV, team coming to town that you take a lot of pride playing against, a lot of pride beating,” Peters said. “The last thing you want to do is start bad, and that’s what happened. You start bad, sometimes the momentum goes the other way, the ball starts not falling for you.”
Kampe expressed an appreciation for the rivalry between the schools, with both also having been members of the Mid-Continent Conference.
“I’m proud to have the battles and fights we’ve had with them over the years,” Kampe said. “I have a really good team, Valpo has a really good team. It was our turn.”
Valparaiso coach Matt Lottich focused on the most basic of factors — effort.
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“Oakland really brought the fight to us,” Lottich said. “They really controlled the physicality of the game. … I don’t ever want to have a feeling like someone out-toughed us, and that’s the feeling I have.
“I’m going to have guys out there who leave it all on the line. I’m not going to play people who take possessions off, who jog back on defense. I want fighters on the floor.”
Valparaiso won’t have much time to dwell on the loss, playing Detroit Mercy at noon Sunday at the ARC in a game televised by American Sports Network (locally, Comcast SportsNet Chicago).
The struggling Titans (2-13, 0-3) lost 78-64 Friday at Illinois-Chicago.
“We’re going to regroup and learn from this,” Lottich said.
Twitter @MichaelOsipoff