This is when Wichita State basketball players knew they had March Madness potential
The answer is unanimous every time you ask Wichita State men’s basketball coach Isaac Brown or one his players.
When did WSU realize it was good enough to reach the NCAA Tournament?
The question was brought up again on Sunday when the Shockers learned they had indeed reached March Madness and were set to face Drake in a Thursday play-in at Purdue’s Mackey Arena in a 5:27 p.m. game broadcast on TBS.
And the answer remained the same.
“When we went on the road and beat a Southeastern Conference team in Ole Miss,” Brown said. “I felt like back then we had a shot.”
Here’s why that 83-79 win at Mississippi on Jan. 2 resonated so much for the Shockers.
They were coming off COVID-19 issues early in the season, which played a role in the team’s lackluster 1-2 start. WSU had won its first two conference games on the road, knocking off Tulsa and South Florida, but Ole Miss was billed as an even tougher challenge.
So when WSU rallied from seven down in the final eight minutes to win on the road against a SEC team, that injected a confidence into the players that an NCAA Tournament bid was very much within reach.
“I knew that we could get into the tournament after we beat Ole Miss,” said WSU’s Tyson Etienne, the co-player of the year in the American Athletic Conference. “Just because of how much of a dog fight that was. They were an NCAA-caliber team. Just to see the resilience we showed in that game because we were down a lot in that game, but we kept fighting. Everybody was just one unit. Everybody was unified and the celebration after it just showed we were in it together. We were in it for the long run.”
WSU junior center Morris Udeze said he remembers the win at Ole Miss, which capped a five-game winning streak with a third key road win, to be what sealed the unique bond the players shared with a coaching staff that was at that point coaching for their jobs.
“After we won that game, it was like, ‘OK, we’ve got something good going on here,’” Udeze said. “The coaches didn’t give up on us. We didn’t give up on ourselves. I looked at everybody’s faces and everybody was just in attack and ready to go. That’s when it was like, ‘We can really be an NCAA Tournament team.’ And now we’re in the tournament and it’s crazy to look back on everything and how we stuck it out. It’s just amazing.”
WSU trailed 69-62 with 7:39 remaining but scored on 10 of its final 14 possessions and overwhelmed Ole Miss, 21-10, to close out the game.
It wasn’t the first and certainly wasn’t the last time WSU found a way to win a close game. In fact, the Shockers would go on to lead college basketball with the most wins in games decided by five points or less (tied with Oklahoma State with nine such wins).
That poise shown in the crunch-time minutes in Oxford was an early glimpse of what was to come for the entire season. Brown said he admired how none of his players pointed fingers during heated moments during the game. Instead, the adversity brought them closer together as a team.
“That’s when we showed we were mature enough to finish games,” WSU senior Trey Wade said. “Ever since then, these guys have just stayed composed and understood that everything is built off patience. We just try to stay focused and stay the course. That’s the biggest thing for us, staying composed and moving forward.”
The team’s other senior, point guard Alterique Gilbert, also mentioned the Ole Miss win as the game where he felt like WSU showed a new level of resilience.
While WSU had two crucial conference road wins at that point, the Shockers led Tulsa wire-to-wire and were playing with a lead for the final seven minutes of regulation against USF. The Ole Miss game was the first time WSU had to rally from behind in crunch time to win.
“We just continued to fight, that’s what I love about this group,” Gilbert said. “No matter what the situation, we’re going to continue to fight. We’re just grateful for this opportunity now (to play in the NCAA Tournament). A lot of guys, myself included, haven’t been to the tournament. So we’re ecstatic for the opportunity.”
This story was originally published March 16, 2021 at 6:00 AM.
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