“That’s just playing basketball.”
There has been nothing simple about what the Rams are doing, though.
With Tuesday night’s 73-49 win at Northwest, Badin improved to 18-2, fresh off clinching a share of the Greater Catholic League Co-Ed title with Alter — the program’s first league championship since winning the GCL Central in 2007-08.
For a school that hasn’t celebrated a league crown in nearly two decades, and hasn’t reached these heights since the 1988-89 team went 28-0 and captured a Division III state championship, this winter feels different.
But Lowe saw this coming.
“It’s exactly what I expected, honestly,” he said. “I’m a competitor. I want to win every single game I play, and that’s basically what we’ve done.”
The Rams’ senior class — 12 strong — made a decision before the season that four years of work wouldn’t entitle them to anything. No shortcuts. No coasting.
“For us, we came in as a group,” Lowe said. “We kind of knew what we had to do, and that was just keep stacking days and don’t take days off, just because we’re seniors and we already put in our four years.
“You still got to get after it in practice every day.”
That phrase — stacking days — has become a mantra inside the Badin locker room.
It’s also the foundation of a season that is quickly becoming one of the most memorable in school history.
A championship culture
When Rams first-year coach Ben Cosgrove returned from a Florida trip with his team earlier this season, he sensed something shift.
“It’s just been different,” Cosgrove said. “It’s like a championship culture.”
Cosgrove, who took over a senior-heavy roster with high expectations and even higher opinions, admits it wasn’t seamless at first.
“They were full of piss and vinegar,” Cosgrove said. “Every one of them thinks they should be out there, deserves to be out there. So it took them a second to buy in to what I was asking them to do.”
He also had to look inward.
“You realize the team is a reflection of you,” Cosgrove said. “They’re a reflection of your energy, and I changed my energy. It’s been unbelievable since. It’s been fun.”
The buy-in is evident.
Cosgrove points to the night before the Rams played for a share of the league title. Badin had shifted a school dance to Thursday night. Students were off Friday. It made him nervous.
“I put a curfew on the guys. But they slipped up Thursday. We had some letdowns,” Cosgrove said. “We didn’t talk about it much Friday. We talked about staying the course for six more weeks. Stay the course, stay the course.”
The Rams won the league championship. Then came Sunday’s practice.
“I told them to bring their running shoes,” Cosgrove said. “What those guys went through for the first 15 minutes of practice on a Sunday without even touching a basketball, right after winning the GCL championship, tells me everything I need to know about this team.”
The 18-2 record, Cosgrove insists, is no accident.
“We played the defending state champs in South Carolina. We beat them,” the coach said before thumbing through the schedule. “A Final Four team from Tennessee. A Final Four team from Louisiana. You play Alter twice. You play McNick twice. You play Chaminade Julienne twice. Hamilton at Fairfield. Summit Country Day. CHCA. 18-2 is no fluke.”
And yet, even after a 24-point win Tuesday, Cosgrove saw room for growth.
“We just put up 73 points and were probably 2 of 100 at the free-throw line,” Cosgrove said with a grin. “We missed about 15 easy layups. We took a few breaks at the defensive end. That’s the stuff that can derail a team like this.”
The message hasn’t changed.
“We’ve just got to keep grinding,” he tells them. “We kept grinding, and the next thing you know, you’re up 25.”
Echoes of 1989
Inside the Badin gym, the comparisons are impossible to ignore.
The 1988-89 Rams went 28-0 and finished with a state championship trophy. This year’s team is two more victories away from becoming the school’s first 20-win squad since the 1996-97 (20-6) and 1997-98 (21-6) teams did it — reaching the Division II state semifinals both seasons.
“But to get there, you’ve got to get the first one,” Cosgrove stated.
“They know how good they are. But they’re as good as they are because it has nothing to do with the end goal and only the current obstacle right in front of you.”
For Lowe, that means focusing on practice before Friday’s showdown with La Salle and Saturday’s regular-season finale at CHCA.
“Now it’s tomorrow in practice,” Lowe said. “We’ve got to get better every day.”
That culture — iron sharpening iron, as Cosgrove calls it — may be the Rams’ greatest strength.
“What makes a great coach?” Cosgrove said, smiling. “Freaking great players, man. We’ve got some great players.
“But you’ve got to continue to win the first one. And then the second one. And so on.”
For now, the Rams are 18-2, league champions for the first time in 18 years and writing a season that has stirred memories of 1989.
And if you ask Carson Lowe what it all means?
He’ll just shrug.
“I just want to win every game I play.”
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