Jack Gohlke’s March joyride ends with fans chanting his name, lining up for selfies

More than an hour after an overtime loss to NC State ended his team’s unforgettable season, Jack Gohlke’s March joyride still wasn’t quite over.

Fans in neighboring sections of PPG Paints Arena stood and applauded the Oakland guard and enthusiastically chanted his name Saturday night when he entered the crowd to greet friends and family. Gohlke, still in full uniform, then graciously signed autographs and posed for pictures when a throng of Oakland fans lined up in the aisle to meet him.

In the span of three days, Gohlke has gone from Horizon League obscurity to overnight celebrity. The catch-and-shoot specialist appeared on SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt, amassed more than 50,000 Instagram followers and signed endorsement deals with TurboTax, OOFOS and other companies.

Gohlke’s star turn began Thursday night when he came off Oakland’s bench to bury 10 threes against Kentucky and propel the 14th-seeded Golden Grizzlies to a stunning first-round NCAA tournament upset. Multiple future NBA guards chased Gohlke around screens in hopes of preventing him from getting clean looks yet they were powerless to stop the grad transfer from Division II Hillsdale College.

Two days later, Gohlke again was one of the main reasons Oakland put a scare into NC State and even had a chance to win the second-round matchup at the end of regulation. Despite the Wolfpack blanketing him throughout the game, Gohlke still managed to score 22 points and sink six of his 17 3-point attempts.

When it was all over, Gohlke described himself as disappointed that his team had lost yet happy to have had this experience.

“We really wanted to win today,” Gohlke said. “I wanted to go to Dallas really bad. All the guys wanted to go to Dallas really bad, but I told them in the locker room, the thing I wanted the most really was to see everyone at practice on Monday. That’s the thing I’m going to miss the most is just seeing my guys every single day.”