‘Shocker basketball is still here’: 5 things to know from WSU’s road win at Ole Miss
Here are five things to know coming out of Wichita State’s 83-79 road victory at Mississippi at The Pavilion on Saturday evening. WSU improved to 6-2 on the season, while Ole Miss dropped its first home game of the season and fell to 5-3.
1. Wichita State’s road warrior mentality hasn’t gone away
The WSU men’s basketball Twitter account posted a video of interim coach Isaac Brown addressing the players hours before they were set to take on SEC foe Mississippi.
“We win this game, I promise you, we’re going to send a message around the country if we win this game,” Brown told the Shockers.
WSU followed through with a message in an 83-79 road victory at Ole Miss. The Shockers (6-2) won their fifth straight game, including three wins on the road as an underdog, and Brown became the first rookie coach in program history to win their first three road games in 56 years.
“The message is that Shocker basketball is still here,” Brown proclaimed afterward. “We have a rich basketball history. These guys came here for one reason: our proud tradition. And they’re trying to keep that thing going.”
Under long-time coach Gregg Marshall, the Shockers were always a tremendous road team. That hasn’t changed this season under Brown, as WSU has won its first three road games of this season and is now 14-5 in its last 19 road games dating back to February 2019.
“We’re confident, but not complacent,” WSU junior Dexter Dennis said. “This group is a special group. We want to do a lot of big things.”
“We needed that game and we needed that win, but it’s back to the drawing board when we get back to Wichita,” added WSU sophomore Tyson Etienne, who scored a career-high 29 points.
WSU was given just a 7% win probability when it trailed 69-62 with less than eight minutes remaining. But the Shockers ripped off an 11-2 run and took the lead on an NBA-range three from Etienne, who scored eight points in the final eight minutes to lead WSU to the come-from-behind victory.
“These guys have no quit in them,” Brown said. “Even when we get down, they stay together and keep battling. I’m so proud of the how they continued to stick together and play together and play the right way.”
2. Tyson Etienne’s deep range devastates Ole Miss
Dennis may have put it best following Tyson Etienne’s career night in Oxford.
“What can you do?” pondered Etienne’s WSU teammate. “He’s shooting it from five feet behind the line. He’s going in the lane and finishing. What do you do?”
Ole Miss never was able to answer that question, as Etienne torched the Rebels for 29 points (19 in the second half) on just 15 field-goal attempts. He made five threes in total, including two preposterous ones — a game-tying triple and a go-ahead one — in the second half that would have been well behind the NBA three-point line.
“He made some unbelievable shots at 25 feet with a hand in his face,” Ole Miss coach Kermit Davis said. “All you can do is sit there and say you can do everything but foul him.”
Etienne’s long-range bombs from Ole Miss’ half-court logo were reminiscent of all-NBA player Damian Lillard.
“I watch those NBA guys on the TV and when they get it going, they have so much confidence that they can make shots from anywhere,” Brown said. “That’s what it was like.”
The college three-point line measures 22 feet, 1¾ inches and Alterique Gilbert said watching Etienne bomb away well behind that line is not a surprising sight to his teammates.
“He shoots it deeper in practice, to be honest,” Gilbert said with a smile. “When he gets hot like that, we’re not surprised. At all.”
Etienne said shooting from deep has always been one of his favorite hobbies.
“I’ve always shot long three-pointers,” Etienne said. “I don’t really shoot college three-pointers. It’s always been like that. I’ve never really shot the line. It’s just something that I do. I feel comfortable from that range and it doesn’t feel like a stretch.”
Etienne’s first bomb erased a seven-point deficit for WSU to tie the game at 54 midway through the second, then his second one was a go-ahead basket for the Shockers late in the second half.
Both shots sparked Shockers and demoralized the Rebels. They count as three points like any other three-pointer, but Etienne said he believes they can swing a game’s momentum even more.
“You play great defense and keep somebody off the three-point line and push them out, then somebody hits a three from that far out and it’s kind of back-breaking,” Etienne said. “It’s unexpected. But that’s just part of my skill set.”
Etienne’s two long-range triples will grab the attention, but it was really a complete performance by the 6-foot-2 sophomore. Not only did he make five three-pointers, but he also made a mid-range jumper, finished twice at the rim and made 8 of 9 free throws — all while sitting out just 52 seconds of game time.
It was the third 25-point-plus performance of the season by Etienne and Brown said he has a feeling there will be more this season.
“Tyson Etienne is one of those guys it wouldn’t surprise me if he has a bunch of 30-point games,” Brown said. “Because he works at it, he’s a competitor, he never gets tired and he thinks he can make every shot he takes.”
3. Isaac Brown is living up to his players’ coach reputation
When Brown was given the job on an interim basis before the season, former Shockers raved about him as a players’ coach.
Brown has made it clear he intends to follow the winning blueprint created by former head coach Gregg Marshall, but it’s also clear after eight games there are already some differences in the Shockers. WSU may run fewer offensive sets and give up more offensive rebounds, but the players are undoubtedly playing more loosely and freely this season.
Like his predecessor, Brown has found a way to empower his players.
“A lot of it has to do with our leadership in the locker room,” Brown said. “When we first started the season and I got the job, we talked about keeping it 100. That’s what the young boys like to say. Be real with it. So when I get on the guys, I don’t have to say anything else because we have other leaders on the team that will come at them if they’re not doing something the right way.”
Dennis, one of WSU’s veterans, said that the overall mood in practices has been a little different this season.
“We can get onto one another without it becoming personal,” Dennis said. “This group really just wants to win, that’s the main goal. If somebody messes up, you take what they say, take the message and move on. We all just want to win at the end of the day.”
Alterique Gilbert, a fifth-year transfer from Connecticut, has been impressed by Brown’s ability to handle players. The players’ coach reputation is well-earned, he said.
“First and foremost, he gives you a lot of confidence,” Gilbert said. “He’s always talking and he’s loud. You always know he is there. He’s very hand’s on and a great leader in my opinion.”
Brown’s touch has been particularly well-received by players who are off to cold shooting starts to the season like Dennis and Trey Wade. Brown has not criticized them for their poor shooting percentages, instead ensuring them that if they continue to take wide-open shots their percentages will even out over the course of the season.
On Wednesday, both Dennis and Wade made crucial shots in the final three minutes of the game to help WSU secure the victory at Ole Miss.
“You’ll hear us say, ‘Next play, move on’ a lot,” Dennis said. “If you’re sitting dwelling on your mistake in the past, you may mess up again. You have to be ready for the next opportunity. I think coach Brown and a lot of our older guys preach that message. It’s just move on and be ready for the next play.”
4. WSU trusted Trey Wade and he delivered in the clutch
Some coaches would have benched the senior from Marietta, Georgia and they might have had a point, as Wade entered this weekend shooting 31.5% from the field and just 9.8% on three-pointers (3 of 20) in his first seven games.
But Brown kept his faith in Wade, promoting him back to the starting lineup for Saturday’s game and the senior 6-foot-6 forward responded with his best performance of the season — nine points, 10 rebounds, five assists — at Ole Miss.
“I’m a big believer when those guys are missing shots, just telling them, ‘You’re wide open, keep taking them. You’re going to make shots, just keep defending at a high level and doing all the little things,’” Brown said. “I”m not worried about makes and misses. The only thing I’m worried about is if you’re not playing Shocker basketball.”
While the headlines will (rightfully) go to Etienne for scoring a career-high 29 points, Wade is an under-the-radar hero for the Shockers with three clutch plays he made in the decisive final three minutes.
- With WSU trailing 74-73, Wade confidently stepped into a go-ahead three-pointer from the top of the key to put the Shockers back in front, 76-74, for good with 2:57 remaining. Wade has only made four three-pointers this season, but two — he made a crucial one in the final minute of regulation at South Florida — have come in big moments for WSU.
- Wade was credited with a team-high five assists, although the first four were generous by the statistician. But Wade’s fifth assist was legit and maybe the most important of the game for WSU. With the Shockers clinging to a 78-76 lead in the final 70 seconds and the shot clock dwindling, Wade dribble penetrated, attracted a help defender and smartly kicked to Dennis on the baseline for an open jumper he swished for WSU’s final field goal of the game.
- Keeping Ole Miss off the offensive glass was a challenge for WSU the entire second half, but Wade did his part. With WSU’s three centers combining for one defensive rebound in 40 minutes, Wade’s team-high seven defensive rebounds were all the more crucial. When WSU needed to board out, it was Wade who came up with four of the final six defensive rebounds of the game.
“He’s making big plays for us,” Etienne said of Wade. “He’s getting rebounds that we need. He’s making shots that we need. The rest of his game is going to open up as the year comes, I”m not worried about that. But it’s times like that as a senior stepping up and making big plays we needed him. We don’t win that game without him.”
5. How the Shockers overcame their flaws to still win
Before the game, WSU figured how well it handled Ole Miss’ pressure and how well it kept the Rebels off the offensive glass would determine the game. They were wrong.
WSU committed a season-high 16 turnovers, which Ole Miss converted into a 31-14 advantage in points off turnovers. The Rebels also grabbed six more offensive rebounds and doubled the Shockers in second-chance points, 20-10.
“If you tell yourself you get (31) points off turnovers and you make nine threes, you win the game,” Ole Miss coach Kermit Davis said. “With our team, if we get 79 at home, it should be a slam dunk. You win that game every time, but we didn’t do it (Saturday).”
WSU was able to survive losing its two keys to the game because it did something rather unexpected: it absolutely shredded the defense of Ole Miss, which was ranked No. 6 in Ken Pomeroy’s adjusted defensive efficiency entering the game.
Ole Miss had the eighth-best scoring defense (56.9) and 13th-best field goal percentage defense (36.9%) in the country, not that you could tell when the Shockers scored 83 points (1.24 points per possession) and shot 52% on Saturday — all season-best performances by WSU’s offense and against Ole Miss’ defense.
Perhaps the biggest surprise was WSU’s success against Ole Miss near the rim. The Rebels boasts one of the best two-point percentage defenses in the country, largely because they limit opponents to 44.7% shooting — nearly 10% points below the national average — near the rim, per Synergy. According to Synergy’s game log on Saturday, WSU finished 14 of 22 on shots (63.6%) near the rim against Ole Miss.
The Shockers had eight different players finish at least one shot near the rim, but credit for a good chunk of WSU’s success goes to Morris Udeze and Dennis. Both players had struggled mightily to finish around the rim this season, but the duo combined for a perfect 5-of-5 shooting near the rim on Saturday.
Shots that had been falling out of the rim for those two this season finally started dropping on Saturday.
This story was originally published January 3, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
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