1995–96 Wright State Raiders men's basketball team

The 1995–96 Wright State Raiders men's basketball team represented Wright State University in the 1995–96 NCAA NCAA Division I men's basketball season led by head coach Ralph Underhill.

The second season in the Midwestern Collegiate Conference was also the second with future first-round NBA selection Vitaly Potapenko. It was a season of heightened expectations followed by competitive but often disappointing results. After an encouraging non-conference season, the MCC season began 0–4. The Raiders fought back and finished the season 8–4 to earn a 4th seed in the tournament, which they hosted. An early exit to 5th-seeded Detroit Mercy seemed a fitting end to a good season, yet one with missed opportunities.

When Wright State moved up to Division I, men’s basketball was competitive on the floor from the start, and remained so in 1995-96. Off the floor, the program was not yet at the Division I level. They lacked a full time strength coach. They lacked a full time academic advisor, which resulted in losing athletes to academic issues. One secretary was supporting several athletic teams. The head coach didn’t have a multi-year contract. It wasn’t a lack of commitment to sports, but rather that the school was slow to shift fully from what had been a strong Division II program to the support required in Division I.

Even before the previous season had ended following their upset of Xavier in the MCC tournament, the local media had begun calling for head coach Ralph Underhill to be awarded an extended contract.
Reporters argued that the highly successful coach was undercompensated compared to neighboring Division I head coaches. In response to this Mike Cusack began negotiations for what was expected to be a three-year contract deal.

The offseason had the ups and downs of college athletics. Star center Vitaly Potapenko was coming back and expected to play two more seasons. New recruit Keion Brooks and junior college transfer Johnnie Blake were cause for excitement. But on the down side Rob Welsh broke his ankle, Jason Smith was lost due to academic issues and Blake hadn’t joined the team at the start of the season. Potapenko, who was apparently a good student maintaining a “B” average, had yet to pass the required English as a second language exam as required by the University. His English language skills were noticeably a work in progress.

The most profound change, however, was the new university president, Dr. Harley Flack. Flack was a polymath with a quiet, academic demeanor. He was also described as having a "strong capacity for moral indignation." The new boss couldn’t have posed a more profound contrast to the passionate head coach. Their apparent feud would play out in the press and alter the trajectory of Wright State basketball.

Underhill routinely scheduled top-tier programs, and always coached like he expected to win. He was known to ride the referees, and notably when hosting Wisconsin in December 1995 he earned a technical foul that helped secure Wisconsin’s comeback win. For this he was soundly criticized in the local media. Just four days later, Underhill found himself at cross-town rival University of Dayton with his star center Vitaly Poptapenko running a fever and playing like it. The frustration of the day got the best of the veteran coach and he earned two technical fouls, which is an automatic ejection from the game.

President Dr. Harley Flack was embarrassed by these events. First he suspended the talk of a new three-year contract, details of which were already appearing in the press. He then demanded that Coach Underhill be put on notice that further technical fouls would lead to suspension and any additional ejections to termination. Dr. Flack also stopped going to the basketball games as a public rebuke of his coach, explaining that coaches must be “worthy ambassadors of Wright State.” In a statement to the press, Dr. Flack outlined his subjective four-point plan for evaluating Underhill after the season: Building athlete character and citizenship, academic achievement, coach’s character, won loss record.

Athletic Director Mike Cusack prevailed upon the president to rescind the probationary status after just six games, pointing out that Underhill and only been ejected once before in 17 years. Flack announced that contract talks would then be suspended until the off season. Guard Rick Martinez quit the team about the same time, adding further stress to the team and staff.

After pressure came from the university board of directors Flack eventually permitted Cusack and Underhill to resume contract negotiations. A two year contract was agreed to on February 9 and signed by Flack on February 12. The team celebrated by upsetting Butler at Hinkle Fieldhouse that evening.

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