This is an opinion column.

Jack Gohlke is Greg Sankey’s worst nightmare.

The backup guard from Pewaukee, Wisconsin had the audacity to nail 10 (ten) 3-pointers against the biggest of blue bloods from Sankey’s regal conference.

He plays for Oakland.

That’s a school … get this … in Michigan.

And his unconscious effort Thursday night lifted 14-seeded Oakland past mighty Kentucky in an NCAA tournament where Sankey may or may not think he belongs.

Jack Gohlke, a graduate student whose favorite road trip snack is pineapples.

Jack Gohlke, a 24-year-old who previously picked Bradley Cooper to play him in a movie that he practically wrote in Pittsburgh on Thursday night.

That Jack Gohlke’s 32-point night was the steam engine that ran over the cornerstone of SEC basketball royalty and perhaps the argument for more big boys at the table.

The 80-76 loss left the SEC 0-for-3 in tournament games to that point in the day. No. 2 seeded Tennessee salvaged some pride with an 83-49 pounding of the same St. Peter’s program that stunned Kentucky two years ago as a 15-seed.

It’s poetic given Sankey, the villain in Bradley Cooper’s possible upcoming basketball flick, has some thoughts on schools like Oakland.

The SEC commissioner did a lot of “saying it but not saying” it in recent interviews about the relationship between power conference teams (like Kentucky) and the automatic qualifiers from mid-major conferences (like Oakland). The idea is to expand the field beyond 68 but not necessarily to add Selection Sunday snubs like Indiana State. This is about the Power 4 of the expanding SEC, Big Ten, ACC and Big 12.

“We are giving away highly competitive opportunities for automatic qualifiers (from smaller leagues),” Sankey told ESPN, “and I think that pressure is going to rise as we have more competitive basketball leagues at the top end because of expansion.”

You know who wasn’t competitive on Thursday? Mississippi State. The Bulldogs took a 69-51 beating from Michigan State in the first game of the day.

You know who else wasn’t competitive? South Carolina. The Gamecocks lost 87-73 to Oregon later Thursday.

We need more of that?

Meanwhile, the Atlantic-10 Conference went 2-0. That includes 11-seed Duquesne (a school in Pittsburgh) beating Big 12 at-large bid recipient BYU.

Anyway, Sankey in a few interviews cited examples of why the power conferences should get more love than these little guys. He spoke about Ole Miss baseball going from the last team selected for the 2022 NCAA baseball postseason it eventually claimed in Omaha.

Point taken.

He also talks about UCLA going from a First Four play-in round win in 2021 to the Final Four. Also, a good point. What he didn’t mention was little fella VCU did the exact same thing in 2011.

The play-in games this week didn’t help the argument, either.

Virginia took a 67-42 loss to Colorado State in Dayton for one of the No. 10 seeds. The ACC school made exactly 25% of its shots, went 11 straight basketball minutes without scoring, made everyone’s eyes bleed and lost by 25 to the Mountain West Conference team.

The SEC delegation didn’t help much on opening day.

Mississippi State’s 51 points Thursday were eight fewer than its previous season low of 59 scored against Southern.

South Carolina put up a better fight but made just 9 of 22 layups, trailed by as many as 18 and never got the deficit under 10 in the final 17 minutes.

Of course, both of those SEC losses came to fellow power conference elite. But do we need sloppier 15-point games between the middle of the best?

Sankey points to UCLA in 2021 (again, not VCU in 2011) and Syracuse in 2018 going from the play-in to the Sweet 16 as reasons to have this conversation. He also noted FAU making the Final Four last year and St. Peter’s going to the Sweet 16 a year before that.

“There are great stories and we certainly want to respect those great stories, but things continue to change,” Sankey said in an interview with The Athletic last week at the SEC tournament. “There’s nothing wrong with a review, and again, I think that’s the healthy kind of conversation that should take place.”

The ever-expanding Division I and static tournament field is another of Sankey’s points.

“So we’re going to have to continue to adapt,” the commish told The Athletic. “I think that’s healthy conversation. I don’t make that decision, but I certainly can make observations.”

It’s kinda like the old cable “news” trick of “just asking questions” to steer the conversation toward his desired destination. And hey, he’s got a job to do and that’s to advocate for his conference within this twisted world of college athletics.

But if there’s one thing … seriously, one thing … that unites so many of us in this divided world, it’s this tournament.

The board-room types have ruined so many things already with misguided conference realignment, the snow-ball-to-avalanche mismanagement of everything NIL, etc.

So, it took our guy Jack Gohlke and not-California Oakland to remind us how unbroken the NCAA tournament really is.

Do we need more 51-point Mississippi States, 42-point Virginias interrupting an Impractical Jokers marathon because that one time UCLA got hot? Or Syracuse made the same Sweet 16 as three automatic-qualifier 15-seeds in the last three seasons?

Just asking questions but after my own observations, Sankey’s worst nightmare had the answer Thursday night.

Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.