Cal State Northridge isn't widely regarded as a hotbed of college basketball.
"About the only thing people know about us is this is where the earthquake hit in 1994," Matadors' senior forward/center Brian Heinle quipped.
Brian Heinle of Cal State Northridge (31) reaches to tip the ball against Portland State. Heinle led the Big Sky Conference in scoring and rebounding this season.
"We're a commuter school (of 21,440). It's tough to get a fan base of any size. It's not like we have a 20,000-seat arena (theirs seats 1,800). Until now, people's agendas didn't have men's basketball on the top of their list."
This week, CSN's campus is abuzz with talk of the Matadors, who have snared the school's first-ever NCAA Tournament berth.
Cal State Northridge will take a 22-9 record and No. 13 seed into Friday's 6:40 p.m. first-round Midwest Regional battle against No. 4 seed Kansas (24-6) at Dayton Arena.
"Up until now I could walk around on campus and not talk a word about basketball," Heinle said. "Now that we've won our (Big Sky) conference championship and postseason tournament, people are congratulating us and we're starting to get the recognition I feel we deserved.
"This is our second straight 20-win season. We're starting to get our due."
Heinle would be a big man around campus if he attended a basketball power like, say, Kansas. The 6-foot-9, 225-pound senior from Eugene, Ore., last week was named Big Sky Player of the Year.
Rightfully so.
He led the league in scoring (20.2 ppg) and rebounding (9.5) and posted 18 double doubles, the fifth best total in the country.
Despite suffering from a dislocated ring finger on his shooting hand, Heinle stepped up and scored 26 points in the semifinals and 21 in the finals of the Big Sky Tournament.
"He's a guy who can beat you in a lot of ways," Northridge coach Bobby Braswell said of Heinle, a 51 percent shooter, who has hit 46 of 106 threes for 43.4 percent. "It's been a pleasure watching him grow and mature."
A former University of Oregon assistant, Braswell has known Heinle a long time.
Let Braswell explain:
"I am legal guardian of my nephew Carl Holmes," Braswell said of the Matadors' senior guard, who averages 7.4 points a game.
"Carl is basically like my son. He lived with us in Oregon. Carl and Brian were on the same youth teams. I remember Brian was a 6-foot-4, 6-5 kid in the seventh grade. He always could shoot the mess out of it."
Braswell offered Heinle a scholarship despite the fact he was a skinny high school senior.
"When he arrived (at Northridge), he was 6-foot-9, 100 pounds," Braswell said.
"More like 104 pounds," Heinle joked. "I worked pretty hard in the summers, especially last summer and it's done a lot for my body and my confidence."
KU center Eric Chenowith, a native of Orange, Calif., played with, and against, Heinle in games at a camp last summer in Las Vegas.
"Brian is a very athletic 4-man, a good shooter. He showed me a lot this summer. A couple times he'd get ready to pass it and I'd say, 'Shoot it,' because he can really shoot the ball," Chenowith said.
Heinle is as complimentary to Chenowith.
"Eric is an excellent player. He has size and soft touch," Heinle said. "We went after each other last summer and were on the same team, too. He does his job. He gets on the glass and does a lot of good things."
Heinle does so many good things he's known as "our go-to guy," Matadors' junior point guard Markus Carr said.
"Markus gets me the ball right where I need it in the rhythm and flow of the game," Heinle noted. "It's almost like we're a little telepathic. He knows when I'll be open and how the ball will get there. He's a great point guard."
And Braswell's a "great coach," Heinle said.
"I didn't know anything about Cal State Northridge when I came here except coach Braswell," Heinle said. "He promised me a lot. I trusted him and it's worked out. I think my game has progressed to where I might be able to play at the next level. Maybe some other people don't think I can, but it's fine with me. It's what I believe."
And the Matadors believe they can play with Kansas.
"Kansas has a lot of size. They are stacked, ready and hungry because they know they have not done as well as they probably should have done the last couple years in the tournament," Heinle said. "They'll be a hungry team. On the other hand, we have a lot of experienced guys and we want to win every time we play."
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