The 10 things to know about Wichita State Shockers basketball so far this season
Here are the 10 things to know about the Wichita State Shockers men’s basketball team ahead of Tuesday’s game against Tarleton State.
1. The offensive evolution of Ricky Council IV
Council is a well-documented bucket-getter and his performance in Saturday’s 64-58 win over South Alabama cannot be understated.
In a game where almost no one for WSU was playing well offensively, Council was brilliant, scoring 19 points on 11 shots and making tough shot after tough shot for the Shockers.
But tough shot-making is Council’s forte, what he’s known for. In order for WSU’s burgeoning star to take the next step in his game, Council needs to start becoming more of a play-maker for others.
That’s why it wasn’t Council’s 19 points that was the most promising development in Saturday’s game; it was his three assists, tying his career high. And that number could have easily been higher, as Council made three other passes that led to good looks for WSU that would have been assists if the shot dropped.
“He’s definitely a guy that can create off the bounce,” WSU coach Isaac Brown said. “When he draws help, I’m glad he’s throwing it to the open guys and doing a great job of getting his teammates involved.”
Being a 6-foot-6 tough shot-maker makes Council an extremely valuable piece to the Shockers this season, possibly even the X Factor if he becomes a consistent scoring threat for the team. But that brings more defensive attention.
Council is skilled enough to still score under those circumstances, but to truly unlock his full potential, he will have to become a threat to pass too. He finished with just 20 assists in 21 games last season, but in his first serious run of the 2021-22 season, Council showed improved decision-making in finding the balance between aggressively looking for his shot and finding the open shooter.
The best example of that came late in the second half of the South Alabama game, with the score tied at 51, when Council drove baseline and collapsed the defense. He could have forced a short jumper over the crowd. Instead, he kicked it to Dexter Dennis, standing all by himself on the three-point line, to give his teammate a wide-open look that he made for a critical, go-ahead basket.
2. What was wrong with WSU’s point-of-attack defense?
If there was one thing that South Alabama exposed against Wichita State, it was the Shockers’ point-of-attack defense.
South Alabama was so effective at attacking the rim, where it made 19 of 32 shots for a 59.4% success rate, WSU finally had to surrender trying to play man-to-man defense and switch to zone.
As Brown said after the game, WSU simply could not stay in front of South Alabama with the athleticism the Jaguars had at all five positions.
There was one stretch midway through the second half where South Alabama was so confident in the mismatch that Javon Franklin created against WSU’s defense that it just fed him the ball at the free throw line three straight possessions and cleared out for him to attack.
And three straight times it worked. On the first, Franklin took WSU center Morris Udeze off the dribble, spun and finished at the rim. On the second, WSU tried to put a quicker defender on Franklin in wing Ricky Council, only to watch Franklin back him down and easily finish on a hook shot in the paint. On the third, the rest of WSU’s defense was so used to Franklin scoring in isolation that Council, this time on the perimeter, was caught ball watching and Franklin hit his man on a back-door cut for an easy layup.
It was an embarrassing stretch for WSU and Brown said it was a breakdown in WSU’s fundamental philosophy on defense.
“We didn’t do our normal principles on defense,” Brown said. “Normally we’re in the gaps and we make you pass the ball out. We try to get deflections. It’s not like us to give up layup after layup after layup.
“So (in Sunday’s practice) we worked on being in the gap and helping your man out. Even though you’ve got to guard your yard, we want to make sure everybody is providing help and being in the right spot and make the team kick it out and then contest the three-point shot.”
Tarleton State, with a five-guard lineup that loves to attack the rim, will be a good test to see if WSU learned its lesson in practice since Saturday’s game. As Brown pointed out, WSU’s guard must do a better job of digging down and making it more difficult for opponents to dribble from the perimeter straight to the basket.
The biggest challenge for WSU is when teams isolate its centers, Morris Udeze and Kenny Pohto, and have more athletic and smaller players attack. That will be the case on Tuesday night against Tarleton State, but Brown said he wants WSU’s bigs to win that battle of trade-offs at center.
“I don’t want to change just because the other team changes,” Brown said. “I hope since the fact that they’re small that we can use our big guys to score. We’ve got to try to take advantage of us scoring inside. We’re the bigger team. When I watch other teams playing them, they were able to take advantage of that.”
3. How much will Wichita State play small ball this season?
There haven’t been many lineup combinations so far this season where Wichita State’s offense has thrived.
The one that has? When Brown goes to four-guard lineups with Dexter Dennis playing power forward. In 26 possessions, which account for 20% of WSU’s season total, four-guard lineups with Dennis at power forward are scoring 1.23 points per possession and have outscored the opposition, 32-26.
That is a significant bump up from the 0.89 points per possession that WSU’s traditional lineups are scoring this season.
So far Brown is going small mostly to close halves. Against South Alabama, Brown closed the final 6:03 of the game with Dennis at power forward and WSU pulled away by winning the closing stretch 21-14.
Playing Dennis at power forward isn’t necessarily what makes the lineup effective, rather that playing Dennis at power forward opens up a spot for Ricky Council to share the floor with Tyson Etienne at shooting guard and whoever is running the point. It’s hard to argue that doesn’t put WSU’s best offensive lineup on the floor.
But Brown also trusts Joe Pleasant and Monzy Jackson at power forward, a duo that should play the majority of minutes at the position this season.
Still, it’s hard to deny the potency of the four-guard lineup and it’s something to keep an eye on how Brown employs it the rest of the season.
4. The defensive dominance from Dexter Dennis
It’s easy to take for granted the defensive brilliance of Dennis, now in his fourth season as the stopper for the Shockers.
But Dennis has been especially good in the first two games. He’s only allowed seven points in 17 possessions as the main defender, per Synergy, which ranks in the 91st percentile, and he already has four blocks and four steals.
There’s nothing more demoralizing for an offensive player than to try to take Dennis off the dribble and pump fake, only for him to stand his ground and then smother the shot when it does go up.
“He’s so impressive on defense,” Brown said. “You can put him on a guy and he normally shuts that guy down, I don’t care who it is. He’s one of the better defenders in the country. He understands the scouting report. He’s always in the right position. With his length and long arms, he can always get blocked shots. He’s just been tremendous on defense.”
5. Need more Mo on the block
Morris Udeze averaged 10.3 points and shot 61% on two-pointers in his breakthrough season last year mostly with his back to the basket, using his big frame to play bully basketball down on the block.
Last season, Udeze scored more than a third of his total points on post-up attempts, averaging more than four per game and scoring at a rate (0.90 points per possession) that made him one of the better low-post options in the country.
But through two games this season, Udeze is averaging 5.0 points and shooting 38% on two-pointers. Most troubling, Udeze has only two post-up possessions this season, per Synergy, and has yet to score a single point in a post-up chance.
“He’s got to get back to that,” Brown said. “He’s got to get on the block and start scoring the basketball and take advantage of his strengths. I know he wants to play more out on the perimeter and Mo can step out there and drive and shoot a stationary three. But his bread and butter has got to be with his back to the basket.”
Tarleton State, with a five-guard lineup, could offer just the right opponent to get Udeze going again inside.
6. Health update on star Tyson Etienne
After coming down with an illness the day before Saturday’s game against South Alabama, the preseason American Athletic Conference Player of the Year tried to give it a go but was clearly not himself in WSU’s 64-58 win.
Etienne scored just four points on 1-of-10 shooting, but doled out two key assists down the stretch, grabbed the game’s most important offensive rebound with 16 seconds left and made two straight free throws to secure the win.
But Etienne wasn’t feeling any better the day after the game, as he missed WSU’s practice on Sunday, according to Brown. The coach said he was optimistic Etienne would return to practice on Monday ahead of the Tarleton State game on Tuesday.
“I’m sure he’ll be coming back and ready to go,” Brown said. “He had an off game, but he was under the weather. He was really sick. He missed the day before the game. He missed shootaround. We didn’t know if he was going to play until we called out the starting lineup. Hopefully we can get him back in practice and get him going because he’s one of the best players in the country.”
7. To redshirt or not to redshirt…
Through the first two games of the season, three scholarship players have yet to play for the Shockers: freshman guard Chaunce Jenkins, freshman wing Jalen Ricks and freshman forward Isaac Abidde.
Ricks, an intriguing 6-foot-7 sharpshooter from the prestigious Oak Hill Academy, was not in uniform for Saturday’s game against South Alabama and is the only player in that group currently committed to redshirting.
An ankle injury has slowed Abidde, another high-upside prospect who didn’t arrive at WSU until mid-August, in practice as of late. At 6-9 and range out to the three-point line, Abidde’s talent is alluring, but he is another potential redshirt candidate.
Jenkins, on the other hand, is a second-year player in the program and should be a part of WSU’s rotation at some point this season, as early as Tuesday’s game against Tarleton State.
“You can’t play everybody,” WSU coach Isaac Brown. “Those guys will get their opportunity, they’ve just got to be ready when that time comes. I tell them all the time to just keep the positive energy on the bench and when you get your opportunity, step up and be ready to go.”
Brown believes all three players will help the Shockers in the future.
“That’s why we recruited them here,” Brown said. “All three have bright futures at Wichita State. And right now they’re doing a great job in practice, being on the scout team and making it tough and giving us an example of what it’s going to be like in the game.”
8. Monzy Jackson is putting on a passing show
A pleasant surprise through two games has been the slick passing from sophomore forward Monzy Jackson off the bench. After doling out just 13 assists last season, Jackson has already dished out five passes that have led to points for WSU in two games this season.
And these aren’t run-of-the-mill, swing-the-ball to the open shooter passes. Jackson is passing his teammates open with a variety of thread-the-needle and no-look dimes. Just last game, Kenny Pohto was the recipient of two no-look passes that freed him for two free throws and an open jumper for four points.
“It’s not always about being flashy, it’s about making the right play and I think I’m creative enough to do that kind of thing,” Jackson told The Eagle this summer.
Jackson is still susceptible to ball-watching on defense, which likely explains why he has only played 10.9 minutes per game, but he showed in the South Alabama game how infectious and valuable his energy on the court can be for the Shockers.
After earning the coveted “Junk Yard Dog” distinction last season with his hustle, Jackson is starting to expand his reputation with a new level of play-making.
9. WSU has improved its bugaboo from last season
After finishing as one of the worst defensive rebounding teams in the country last season, WSU said it was committed to being better at cleaning up the defensive glass this season.
So far, so good.
The Shockers have grabbed better than 78% of possible defensive rebounds, a rate that puts them No. 77 in the country and one that is drastically better than last season’s 67% mark. It’s early, but it’s an encouraging start.
The biggest difference? Morris Udeze, WSU’s starting center, is becoming a force on the defensive glass. After averaging just 3.3 defensive rebounds last season, Udeze has secured 13 defensive rebounds through two games this season for a 33.5 defensive rebound rate that ranks him No. 24 in the country, per KenPom.
“In order for us to be an elite basketball team, we’ve got to get two or three guys that averaged five or more rebounds and Morris Udeze is one of those guys who can get a double-double any given night,” Brown said. “That’s the focus this year for him is to be a better rebounder. We’ve got to get him going more to that offensive glass. When we play Tarleton State, smaller teams, we got to take advantage of our size.”
10. Are the Shockers really taking good shots?
Following three straight seasons of being one of the worst-shooting teams in college basketball, WSU has shown no signs of shedding that reputation in the first two games of this season.
The Shockers have an effective field goal percentage of 43.1, which ranks No. 277 in the country. More troubling, WSU has made just 12 of 48 three-pointers this season.
So what’s the problem here?
“I still think it comes down to making shots,” Brown said. “We just didn’t make wide-open threes. If we can start to make some wide-open threes, then I think it will help us get off to a good start. Because they’re going to pack it in and make us make jump shots. Until we prove we can make them, they’re going to pack it in the paint.”
Brown’s gut feeling is backed up by a film study conducted by The Eagle that shows WSU has shot just 23.1% (6 of 26) so far this season on wide-open looks from the perimeter. Only two of WSU’s 48 attempts from deep have been graded as heavily contested or bad shots.
Once again the challenge for WSU is to not find better looks around the three-point line, rather it is to start making the clean looks the Shockers are finding.
This story was originally published November 16, 2021 at 12:35 PM.
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