It’s 10:08 Tuesday morning and Darrell Brooks is sitting over a plate of eggs, bacon and fruit. The 15-year Bowie State men’s basketball coach echoed a sentiment his associate coach muttered minutes earlier before he joined the coaches’ table: “Keep today normal.”

It’s anything but.

Tuesday marked the first night of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association Tournament at CFG Bank Arena in Baltimore. Brooks firmly believes that Day 1 is the toughest; those first steps into the pageantry and pressure of one of the biggest weeks on Baltimore’s calendar.

Bowie State granted The Baltimore Sun exclusive access to their quest to survive and advance.

Here is a look at how Tuesday unfolded for the No. 5 seed Bulldogs (15-13, 7-9 CIAA), who faced No. 4 seed Livingstone (12-15, 4-12 CIAA) in the first round of the tournament:

9:57 a.m. Tip-off is scheduled for 6:40 p.m. (spoiler alert: the night cap didn’t get underway until after 7:30). So players got to sleep in a bit before slowly rolling into a back meeting room of the Baltimore Marriott at Camden Yards — a stone’s throw from CFG Bank Arena. Surely the presence of a reporter influenced discourse, but Brooks and his staff talked about the one-day nature of the life of their season. Across the table was associate coach Bryan Wilson, who has had his hand in a pair of CIAA championship runs: one as a player in 2013 under Brooks then again on his staff in 2017.

This Bulldogs team ended their regular season on a six-game winning streak before a three-game losing skid. Nine juniors and a pair of seniors qualify them as an experienced team in the CIAA. It amounted to the program’s best record since 2019-20. They’re top-five in the conference in average blocks (4.64), assists (14.11) and steals (8.82).

10:25 a.m. The Bulldogs pack into a pair of sprinter vans bound for St. Frances where they’ll have a pregame shootaround. Brooks and Panthers coach Nick Myles go back years. They’re Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity brothers and Myles played at Bowie State. As Wilson said, “They take care of us over there.”

Rappers Future and Yung Q, a Baltimore native, blared over the car speakers to help pass the time as players sunk into seats, burying their noses in individual phones on a ride through city streets under endless CIAA signage.

10:50 a.m. Brooks congregated his team at center court. His message was simple and to the point: “All we’re trying to do is earn another 40 minutes. We got the team to do it. We know what we gotta do. Just come out, play your [butts] off and have fun.”

11:00 a.m. Bowie got a lot of shots up. It was free throws. Then a full-court weave into transition 3s. Then baseline passes to corner 3s and a similar setup for the wing. “We gotta hit shots today,” guard Dylan Edwards said. As a team, Bowie’s shooting splits are .420/.303/.674.

11:35 a.m. They understand the importance of starting fast, too. When they played the Blue Bears in late December, Bowie trailed by 13 after 10 minutes. While players shot free throws, Brooks sat off to the side explaining how Livingstone, which has a slight height advantage, likes to “muck up” the game and force their pace. Bowie needs to make shots early, get the ball rolling to control the tempo.

11:46 a.m. Warren Mouganda flexed in the direction of his coach. “I’m mad. Somebody hit me. I’m ready to go,” he said, more eager than genuinely upset. Brooks shadow-boxed his 6-foot-2 junior guard with a smile.

Mouganda is the team’s energizer bunny, averaging 11.5 points and 3.3 rebounds. He’s got an endless motor, which makes more sense after hearing that he was an exceptional soccer player at St. Vincent Pallotti High School. Under Mouganda’s bio on the team’s website, prompted to describe himself in one word, he wrote, “fun.” One day he wants to be a marine biologist. But right now, he’s got a singular focus. A one-day mindset. Mouganda stepped out the front doors of St. Frances’ West Baltimore gym and stretched his arms under the afternoon sun. “It’s a great day to be a Bulldog,” he said.

12:10 p.m. It’s back up to everyone’s respective hotel rooms to relax until lunch.

2:40 p.m. This one is relatable. The Bulldogs waited in a long line at Chipotle around the corner from the hotel. After their pregame meal, they retired their separate ways.

4:40 p.m. The Bulldogs met in the lobby and walked from their hotel to CFG Bank Arena. Well, Brooks forgot his watch upstairs so he had to run back to his room, then the team began the less-than-five-minute trek. Bowie State looked like the men’s basketball version of “The Beatles” in a procession across the intersection of W. Lombard and S. Eutaw streets. Not much else they can prep now. Or as Brooks said on that walk, “The hay is in the barn.”

He thought back to his 2013 championship team. That was an older group, too. They didn’t face much adversity in late February, waltzing to the CIAA final. This team has some of that same fiber. At least Brooks thinks they’re capable of it.

5:15 p.m. The men’s team settled into the stands to watch their women counterparts.

6:25 p.m. In the waning minutes of the third quarter, the men’s team gathered behind a curtain in the bowels of CFG Bank Arena. This team stretch ended with a call to action from strength coach Marcus Teamer. “The moment ain’t too big for us,” he said. Teamer told them to write history.

6:38 p.m. Coaches and players funneled into the locker room. They circled around a big TV showing the end of Bowie State’s women’s team, which would erase a 20-point deficit en route to a 64-54 win, thanks to 37 points from Destiny Ryles.

6:44 p.m. Wilson cut the TV out. He quizzed each starter to give a spiel about their defensive assignment. “Earn 40 more mins!!!” was written boldly on the whiteboard. Brooks continued with the same message he had all day.

“Fellas, we’ve been talking about this day all year,” he said. “Our last guaranteed 40 minutes. We gotta be the team that’s most energized. We gotta be the team that’s tougher. And we gotta be the team that’s most together. If we do those three things — take care of the basketball against their pressure — we’re gonna earn 40 more minutes. That’s our goal tonight.”

7:33 p.m. Tip-off.

8:28 p.m. The Bulldogs took a 39-28 lead into halftime. Brooks noted to his staff coming off the court, then demanded of his players, a better half of boxing out, limiting second-chance points and avoiding fouls. “We can’t guard much better than we’re guarding,” he said. “We gotta tough this out and find a way to play 40 minutes tomorrow.”

8:46 p.m. Elijah Davis missed a shot. Bowie State’s table setter connected on his first seven tries before a transition layup in the second half resulted in a miss and a hard fall. The Bulldogs go as their senior point guard goes. He knows he’s the “head of the snake.” And Tuesday night, his 27 points and three assists steered Bowie State to a nail-biting, 68-64 win.

9:58 p.m. Edwards scribbled on the locker room whiteboard “40 MORE!!!” Brooks and Mouganda shared a tight embrace. And assistant coach Cedric Baker called the attention of the room to say, “Hey fellas, that was some serious [expletive] good [stuff].” The Bulldogs led by as much as 18. They trailed by as much as four. But they held the lead when it counted, when the final buzzer sounded, and will see Virginia State at 6:40 p.m. on Wednesday night.

Brooks walked off the court heading toward the locker room. His head tilted and shoulders shrugged. “Here tomorrow,” he said.

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