In time of adversity, here’s who stepped up for WSU basketball in overtime win at USF
Allowing a five-point lead to slip away in the final 10 seconds of regulation is not exactly something a college basketball team prepares for.
The resolve of the Wichita State men’s basketball team, with its seven newcomers and an interim head coach, was put to the test on the road Tuesday evening in Tampa, where South Florida made an improbable rally in the closing seconds of regulation to force overtime.
WSU had gone through the rollercoaster of erasing a 13-point deficit, rallying to build a two-possession led, then failing to close out a game when the Shockers had a 98% win probability in the closing seconds.
Faced with its first gut punch of the season, WSU displayed the fortitude it always thought it had to register an 82-77 victory in overtime to move into sole possession of first place in the American Athletic Conference with its second straight upset on the road.
“It’s not really surprising because our guys are always battling in practice,” WSU interim coach Isaac Brown said. “Our first unit battles against our second unit and it’s really competitive every day in practice. We’ve practiced situations like this before. We call it, ‘Late Game.’ You’re up three or down three and you’ve got to win the game. That’s something we practice every day. I’m so proud of the way these guys are battling.”
It’s one thing to do it in practice. It’s another to do it after fouling the three-point shooter twice in the closing seconds. David Collins drew a foul on Tyson Etienne while drilling a three and completed the four-point play with 4.8 seconds remaining to cut WSU’s lead to one. After Trey Wade split a pair of free throws, Collins actually had a chance to win the game for USF in regulation when he baited Alterique Gilbert into fouling him on a three-pointer with 0.4 seconds remaining.
After some strategic timeouts by Brown to ice the shooter, Collins only made two of three to force overtime.
“That was a gut punch,” WSU junior guard Craig Porter admitted. “We weren’t expecting to be in that situation.”
In those moments of adversity, none of WSU’s players panicked — in fact, they formed a players-only huddle immediately following the final buzzer of regulation and multiple voices emerged. Senior Trey Wade made his voice heard, as did graduate transfer Alterique Gilbert and Porter. Etienne, just a sophomore but already the team’s vocal leader, was another strong voice in the huddle.
“Just being with these guys and how much we’ve all been through, we’ve kind had to be coaches for each other as well as being players,” Porter said. “We just all came together and kept everybody positive. No matter what, we were ready for overtime.”
“When I walked into the huddle and I heard the older guys talking, I gave them about 10 seconds to finish and I said, ‘That’s exactly what I wanted to hear,’” Brown said. “I just told them, ‘We have five more minutes. Forget about the first half and the second half. That’s done with. Let’s find a way to win these next five minutes.’”
As the players were taking the court for overtime, Etienne addressed his teammates on the bench and encouraged them by letting them know they could help with the victory.
“We need you guys to help get energized,” Etienne said, according to Brown. “Let’s bring our own energy.”
Any worries of a collapse in overtime were erased when WSU’s defense produced four straight stops to open the extra period. That allowed the Shockers to build a 75-70 lead following five straight points from Porter, the junior-college transfer who has already begun to show a knack for the big play this season for WSU.
USF never had the opportunity to tie the game following Porter’s layup on a fast break with 3:04 remaining.
“I’ve always been prepared for these moments,” said Porter, who won an NJCAA championship his freshman season at Vincennes (Ind.) University.
“I feel like this will boost my confidence a lot. Helping my team, no matter what it has to be, dishing it off, scoring, rebounding, playing defense, I’ll do whatever it takes to get on the floor and help my team win.”
Nothing could spoil the exhilaration of winning an overtime game on the road to start the conference season 2-0.
Etienne, who scored a game-high 25 points but also committed one of the costly late-game fouls, said Tuesday’s victory was nothing but a positive that the Shockers can learn from.
“Everything happens for a reason. We’re a young team and sometimes we’re going to make young mistakes,” Etienne said. “But coach Lou (Gudino) told us to stay positive and that we can’t do anything about the call. We had five more minutes of extra basketball, which is what we wanted. We want to keep playing basketball, so we kept our heads straight and stuck together and we got the win.”
As the head coach, Brown echoed that sentiment: It was a game that WSU can learn from. Tuesday night was reserved for celebration — for the victory, but also because players get to head home for a few days to see their families for Christmas.
There will be a time for criticism, when Brown will show them the film of those final 10 seconds and what WSU must do better next time in that situation.
But as coaches like to say, it’s always better to learn from a win than it is to learn from a loss.
“I think they can learn a lot from this game, with No. 1 being that the game is not over,” Brown said. “I thought when we got fouled (up five with 34 seconds left), we started celebrating on our way to the free-throw line. That was our No. 1 mistake. And then we told them not to foul and to stay square.
“So I think we can learn from this, just like the Oklahoma State loss, where I thought it would help us down the line.”
This story was originally published December 22, 2020 at 9:52 PM.
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