BOULDER — Quinn Denker’s Christmas basketball miracle gave Northern Colorado a win nearly 90 years in the making.

Just a few weeks after sustaining a broken right hand, the Bears’ leading scorer returned following a two-game absence and scored a career-high 33 points in Northern Colorado’s 86-81 win over Colorado at CU Events Center on Sunday.

It was UNC’s first win over CU since Feb. 18, 1936, over five years before the United States joined World War II. The Bears were 15.5-point underdogs.

“It’s about this team, but it’s also about the guys that came so close,” UNC coach Steve Smiley said. “I think about the guys in previous years — the Langston Reynolds, Isaiah Hawthornes, Jaron Rillies, all those guys. We’ve been really close. To get to the point where you can get over the top, it’s not about this team; it’s about the previous teams, but also, it’s for our school, our town. 

“When you’re Northern Colorado, as opposed to Colorado, you’re not supposed to win these games. I don’t think our guys have ever had that mentality. It was a special night.”

It’s a night that felt like it had been brewing for multiple years.

It’s the fourth straight season the Bears made the trip west to Boulder, and twice they had come awful close to beating the team coached by Tad Boyle, who previously coached at Northern Colorado. In 2022, with future first-round NBA draft pick Dalton Knecht leading the way, UNC gave CU a scare before the Buffs pulled away late for an 11-point win.

Then, last November, a shorthanded Bears team took the Buffs to double overtime before CU hung on for a 90-88 win.

The UNC locker room knew a win like this was possible.

“We go into every game (and) we don’t care what league the other team plays (in) or how much money they have… all we’re trying to do is play Northern Colorado basketball against the other day,” Denker said. “When we do that, to our best ability, we’re really hard to beat.”

The Bears were particularly hard to beat Sunday because the Buffs had no answer for Denker. 

The fifth-year senior, now in his second season at UNC, has blossomed into a star in the Big Sky as the Bears’ leading scorer. But he wasn’t supposed to play Sunday. He broke his shooting hand in early December and was told he’d likely be out for two months, potentially the entire season. 

But somewhat of a Christmas miracle happened while Denker and his teammates were away for the holiday break. When he returned to Greeley on Friday, two days before the game against the Buffs, Denker got the “OK” from the medical staff to return to action.

“God’s good,” Denker said. “The fact that I was cleared to play in this game, I was like, ‘I’m gonna do my best and let God handle the rest.’ That was kind of my mindset going into this game.

“A lot of people called me a lunatic because I was still smiling on the bench and doing random stuff. I kind of just trusted God’s plan in everything that happened. This is gonna be part of my story, the fact that I recovered from a two-month-long injury in 12 days.”

Smiley saw a look in the eye of his point guard from the opening tip. Denker was the only UNC player in double figures at halftime and scored bucket after bucket down the stretch to ensure the win. That included the game-winning play.

Knotted at 80 with under 1 minute to play, Smiley drew up what he called “the least-complicated play” in nearly a decade at UNC.

Smiley put the ball in Denker’s hands and told him to dribble left. Everyone else was told to get out of the way. Denker backed his way toward the basket and flipped in a shot from close range.

“(Smiley) trusts me and I don’t take that lightly,” Denker said. “If he trusts me to go get it done, I’m gonna go do whatever I need to do.”

Denker scored six of his team’s final eight points in what goes down as a program-record 10th non-conference victory for the Bears. It’s the first time since becoming a Division I program UNC has won double-digit non-conference games in a season.

That stat won’t mean much if Smiley’s group doesn’t back it up in Big Sky play, which begins this week, but a win this historic might be enough to carry the Bears all the way to a long-awaited return to the NCAA Tournament. 

“I think we have belief, regardless if we win this game or not. This game was just really nice because when you get to Big Sky play, there’s nothing like it,” Denker said. “The Big Sky is just a whole different beast with the rivalries from school to school. We’re just really excited and good to have this momentum.”

GAME RECAP

Northern Colorado 86, Colorado 81

What happened: The Bears (10-3) stormed into CU Events Center and snapped a 13-game losing streak against the Buffs (10-3), beating the team from Boulder for the first time since 1936. UNC shot just under 74% from the field as a team in the second half as it closed non-conference play with a record 10th win in the program’s Division I era.

Star of the night: Quinn Denker returned from a two-game absence and turned in a career-high 33 points on 12-for-18 shooting from the field and 3-for-5 from 3-point range. The senior point guard also chipped in eight rebounds and eight points just a few weeks after suffering a break in his shooting hand in another game.

Quotable: “I feel like we should’ve lost by 25 with those numbers, but they shot 73.9% in the second half. You ain’t beating anybody doing that. I want to use a different word than ‘stuff,’ but it’s the same stuff, just a different day.”

— CU coach Tad Boyle

Up next: Both teams hit the road to begin conference play. The Buffs have a week off as they face Arizona State Saturday in Tempe with tipoff set for 3 p.m. on ESPN2. The Bears begin Big Sky play with arguably the toughest road trip of the season, Thursday at Montana State (7 p.m. ESPN+).