Wichita State on losing end in high-scoring game against AAC rival Cincinnati
Just before the 10-minute mark in the second half, Wichita State’s Jamarius Burton got a layup to go that cut the Shockers’ deficit to three points.
Five seconds later, Cincinnati was up five again.
After scoring only 51 points at Tulsa on Saturday, offensive execution was the topic of discussion with a WSU team that had broken 60 points once in almost three weeks. Thursday, it was the defense that didn’t get it done.
WSU suffered its highest-scoring loss in 349 days dropping a 80-79 game in Koch Arena to American Athletic Conference rival Cincinnati. Defending conference player of the year, senior guard Jarron Cumberland, hit an and-one bucket over Dexter Dennis to tie the score and then the free throw that followed to snare the lead with 3.5 seconds left.
It was the 12th time the Shockers have allowed at least 80 points to an AAC opponent since joining the conference three seasons ago. That happened once in the final three years in the Missouri Valley Conference.
The competition in the AAC is far superior to that in the Valley as the MVC is still a one-bid league to the NCAA Tournament, but Thursday’s loss was jarring.
“For a good amount of games we’ve been playing down the stretch, we couldn’t get the ball in the basket, and today we were able to do so,” Burton said. “We just got to get back to our calling card, which was our defense, which was keeping us in ball games like in Tulsa.
“We just got to hopefully in the next game pair the two, our offense and our defense.”
Although the WSU scoring defense entered Thursday with the second-best mark in the conference, the Shockers have uncharacteristically allowed at least 79 points in two of their past three games, including an 87-79 win over Central Florida.
Cincinnati opened the game on 5-of-5 shooting to jump out to 10 points within the first five minutes. The Bearcats were 8 of 10 in the first 10 minutes, and both misses came on three-point attempts. They shot 68 percent from the field in the first half.
Cumberland finished the first half with seven points. The Shockers, especially Dennis, were outstanding at denying him shot opportunities. But in the second half, he had 17 and finished with 24.
With 7:50 to go, he took over.
Cumberland scored seven points in 78 seconds to give Cincinnati a 70-62 lead.
“All night defensively, I just wasn’t in tune,” Dennis said. “I feel like I gave up too many baskets. Normally I think that doesn’t happen, but tonight it did.”
WSU has lost its past two games by two combined possessions despite neutralized offensive in the first and unstandardized defense in the second. Coach Gregg Marshall called college basketball, “cruel,” after Thursday’s loss.
The Shockers haven’t lost back-to-back games by three points or fewer since the end of the 2011-12 season when they dropped out of the MVC Tournament and NCAA Tournament.
“We’re capable,” Marshall said. “We’re pretty good. We’ve been saying that for a while.”
The silver lining is the Shockers are close — close enough to be two possessions away from 7-2 in the AAC with an 19-2 overall record. But Marshall said he takes no solace in matching Cincinnati through 39 minutes, 56.5 seconds.
WSU scored its most points against Cincinnati since its last home win against the Bearcats in 1981. It also allowed the most points against an unranked Cincinnati team since 1970.
If Cumberland had missed the and-one layup with 3.5 seconds left, Cincinnati would have stayed under 80, and freshman guard Grant Sherfield would have been the hero with a go-ahead three-pointer with 16 seconds left. If Cumberland would have missed the ensuing free throw, the Shockers could have hit a buzzer-beater of their own.
But none of that happened. WSU erased an eight-point deficit with 6:32 to play, but none of that seemed to matter to senior Jaime Echenique, who finished with another double-double with his 19 points and 11 rebounds.
“I’m not pleased with anything,” Echenique said. “I didn’t go up there expecting to put up those numbers. I went expecting to win. I don’t even know what averages I have. If I see it, it’s maybe because I’m reading something.”
Still, WSU had a shot to win it with 2.5 seconds left. Sophomore Erik Stevenson was the inbounder. Looks to Dennis, Sherfield and Burton were shut off. Marshall said a dump off to Echenique was the fourth option. That’s where Stevenson went with the pass.
Echenique caught it and tossed it back to Stevenson for a shot that eerily resembled the shot Tulsa hit against WSU, just on the other side of the floor. The Shockers’ shot was just a few inches off.
The loss leaves WSU losers of back-to-back games for the second time this season heading into a two-game road trip against Houston and UCF.
“It’s some minor things that we have to clean up whether it’s on the defensive or offensive end,” Burton said. “The last two games, we’ve just been a couple plays away.”