OKLAHOMA CITY – On March 23, 2016, Mid-America Christian was playing in its first NAIA National Championship game in the Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, Missouri. With the Evangels trailing by one with five seconds left in overtime, junior guard Malcolm Mann was tasked with bringing the ball up the length of the court and getting the game winning shot up. The pressure could not be higher.
Needing to dribble through three defenders to get a potential game-winning shot off, the Plano, Texas native fearlessly drove down the court into the right lane and heaved the 15-foot floating buzzer beater that banked off the glass and rattled in as time expired, giving MACU the 100-99 win over Georgetown to claim the program's first NAIA National Championship.
While Mann made the winning bucket and finished with 23 points in the title tilt, things did not come so easy for MACU's star point guard.
"From my sophomore year of high school, I really struggled with my self-confidence," Mann stated, reflecting back on his basketball career. "I was very self-conscious and doubted if I was good enough to play at the next level, but everyone around me kept telling me that I'm better than I think I am. Even though I sometimes doubted myself, at the end of the day, I love to win. I think about that moment during the timeout before the final inbound, I remember looking at my brother in the crowd and I gave him a nod. In my mind, I knew we were going to win the game."
Just a year earlier, both Mann and Mid-America Christian were both presented with new challenges. For the Evangels, a legend was passing the baton as the founder of MACU Men's Basketball, Willey Holley, who had recorded 813 wins in his illustrious coaching career and just guided the Evangels to their first Sooner Athletic Conference Championship decided to call it a career at the end of his 42nd season.
Shortly after the conclusion of the 2014-15 season, the Evangels found the next heir apparent, a young gun in the coaching ranks at just 26 years old in Josh Gamblin. Despite his youth, Gamblin had been connected to multiple coaching legends, including Vinny Del Negro, Lon Kruger and Jim Poteet, to name a few, but was ready to step onto the stage and lead his very own program.
Meanwhile, Mann was completing a sensational two-year career at Hesston College, wrapping up a year where he dished out 128 assists and tallied 65 steals in just 32 games. He also had many options for where to take his basketball career.
Even though he had offers to join mid-major NCAA Division I and II programs, Mann reflected on some words from his father to decide his future.
"One thing my dad told me when I was young was that there will be a day where the ball stops bouncing and you need people in your life to show you who you are off the court," Mann said when reflecting on his choice for his next collegiate stop. "One of the biggest reasons why I chose MACU was that our coaches saw value beyond the game in the people they were bringing to campus. Coaches Josh Gamblin and Anthony Nero instilled in us that there are so many way to win. Besides winning on the court, they were building character through the game of basketball. Yes, it was great to be a part of a National Championship, but the culture that Coach Gamblin was developing transcended the game of basketball."
By the time Mann concluded his Evangels' basketball career, he was a proven winner both on-and-off the court. Mann wrapped up his two-year tenure as the program's NAIA Era (2007-present) single season record holder for assists with 184 in 2015-16 as well as third most in a career (338) and ninth most career steals (98). Not only was he named an All-SAC Third Team honoree following the 2016-17 season, but he also became the MACU Men's Basketball team's first ever recipient of the NCCAA's Game Plan 4 LIFE Award, an honor presented to a student-athlete that best exemplifies the Biblical values of love, integrity, faith and excellence.
"I'm just super grateful for everything that MACU had done for me," Mann added. "The GP4L Award was an accumulation of a legacy that was built upon the culture that I was a part of. MACU, Coach Gamblin and Coach Nero created an environment to be successful both on-and-off the court."
"Malcolm is the definition of an Evangel," Gamblin said, reflecting on Mann's impact with the program. "He was an outstanding teammate who always put his brothers on the team before himself. The shot he made in the national championship will live on forever, but the way he led our program and served others is truly what defines him. He was and is a special, special person. I am forever grateful for him and his family."
After graduating from MACU with his Bachelor's in Psychology in 2017 and Master's in Business in 2019, Mann entered a career in ministry. In 2017, Mann married his wife Anna and have two young children together.
Returning to his hometown in Plano, Texas in 2020, Mann became the Young Married Couples Pastor at Grace Church as well as the Mentorship Director for the Top Achievers Foundation, a non-profit organization that mentors junior high and high school children, particularly assisting children from economically challenged backgrounds.
Last year, Mann was presented a new opportunity to serve as the Team Chaplain for the Texas Legends, the NBA G-League affiliate for the Dallas Mavericks.
"One of the biggest inspirations for what I do is I believe that healthy families create healthy communities," said Mann about his role in ministry and the community. "It is rewarding for me to pour into young couples and see them receive true joy, true peace and true hope through the Lord, seeing two people becoming more like Christ, creating a marriage that reflects the beauty of the Gospel."
