With just more than three-and-a-half minutes to play in their NCAA West Regional tournament game today, Cal State Bakersfield was inbounding the ball in a game against Oklahoma that it trailed only 69-65.

That would be Big-Dance-First-Timers Bakersfield. That would be In-D2-a-Decade-Ago Bakersfield. A team with one starter taller than 6-foot-4.

The ball was inbounded to leading scorer Aly Ahmed, the 6-foot-9 center from Egypt, who was alone at the top of the three-point line. Ahmed took his time and fired off a trey, no doubt exactly the shot coach Rod Barnes wanted … and Ahmed just missed.

Had that shot gone in, cutting Oklahoma’s lead to 69-68 with 3:29 to play … well, Michigan State might not have been the only No. 2 seed this day to be shocked out of the tournament by a No. 15 seed.

The Sooners had to know that Michigan State had been outplayed and beaten by Middle Tennessee State in a huge upset that ended in the second half of their game with Bakersfield, and that had to creep them out. Just as did the tenacity of the little guys from a town the Sooners probably couldn’t find with a GPS device.

As it developed, Ahmed’s three-point miss was Bakersfield’s last chance. Oklahoma outscored the Roadrunners 13-3 in the final three minutes to account for an 82-68 outcome that does not tell how tough Bakersfield had been.

The newbies scored the game’s first eight points, to show Oklahoma they were not intimidated. They ran off a 9-0 stretch to lead 19-14. They were down 41-29 late in the half but they scored five points in the final minute to trail only 41-34.

Bakersfield opened the second half with a 12-4 run and — what the hell?!? — they led 46-45 with 14:26 to play. Already at that point the little school from the San Joaquin Valley had done more than enough to make the hometown fans proud.

That shot by Ahmed goes in and … well, things might have been very interesting, instead of the three-point blitz the Sooners went on in the dying minutes as the Roadrunners finally appeared a bit overmatched.

Some observations.

–Ahmed should be able to play for pay, somewhere. In Europe, perhaps, or back home in Egypt. He scored 16 points, all of them in the first half, and appeared exhausted after intermission. He played 35 of the 40 minutes.

–Barnes had a fine game, as a coach, deciding to guard Buddy Hield, the country’s No. 2 scorer, with one man, usually Jaylin Airington, and it worked for most of the game. Hield averages 25; he got 27 by the time it was over, but much of it came late.

–Barnes’s worst moment came at halftime, when he was assessed a technical foul for arguing with officials. Giving a team like Oklahoma two extra free throws is never a good idea.

–Bakersfield, like most of the one-third of the D1 field that aspires to mid-major status … needs to get bigger. They have to recruit a replacement for Ahmed, and they need to find someone bigger than 6-4 who can play. The Roadrunners had D2 teams bigger than this one; I know, because I covered them.

–They have a nucleus for next year. The cool guard Dedrick Basile will be back, as will the athletic Airington and Damiyne Durham, only a freshman this year. Also back, the point guard, Brent Wrapp, who has to develop an attacking game; he had three shots in 25 minutes and the Sooners mostly ignored him.

–If Barnes can’t recruit competent bigs, then he needs to focus on developing three-point shooters. Only Basile looked comfortable beyond the arc (3-for-7 accuracy). The rest of the team was 2-for-11, and little guys have to shoot better than that.

This was the first NCAA Tournament game I watched from start to finish (Hurray, for streaming online!) since 2009 and I became a Bakersfield fan.

The team remained poised until the game was effectively over, the band and cheerleaders showed up in Oklahoma City and Rowdy the celebrated Roadrunner, busted a couple of nice break-dancing moves during a timeout that were caught on the TNT broadcast.

As we wrote a few days ago, a moment at the Big Dance is what aspirational athletic programs like Bakersfield’s bank on. Turns out, they were one of only two schools from the southern half of California to get into the tournament (USC being the other, which lost Thursday; UCLA stayed home), and that says something, too.

The Roadrunners got their moment in the sun, and they didn’t waste it.