The four things that went wrong for Wichita State basketball in K-State game loss
There came a time early in the second half when it felt like the Wichita State men’s basketball team was on the brink of putting Kansas State away.
K-State didn’t seem to have an answer for WSU center Morris Udeze and the Shockers had dominated the first six minutes of the second half, turning a two-point halftime deficit into a seven-point lead.
The near sell-out crowd at Intrust Bank Arena, which was heavily pro-Shockers, was ready to help bury the Wildcats to claim bragging rights in the return of the in-state rivalry game for the first time in 18 years. All WSU had to do was capitalize on the momentum.
Instead, the Shockers suffered through their worst scoring drought of the season — a 7-minute, 25-second scoreless streak that featured 11 straight empty possessions, including eight misses and five turnovers — and ultimately watched K-State pull away for a 65-59 win.
“They did their part,” WSU junior Dexter Dennis said of the crowd. “We just came up short.”
So what went wrong for Wichita State to squander its advantage and end up posting its worst offensive efficiency (0.83 points per possession) of the season?
Here are the four things identified by The Eagle after watching the game film on Sunday night:
1. Wichita State stopped going to what was working
It’s unclear if K-State had an answer to stop WSU junior center Morris Udeze and for that question to still be unanswered is an indictment on WSU’s offense.
There were 12 possessions that ended with Udeze and he scored on 10 of those chances, racking up a game-high and season-high 19 points on 7-of-8 shooting.
Despite that dominance, WSU only went to Udeze a total of four times in the second half — and only once in the game’s final 11 minutes.
“I should have got the ball inside more,” WSU coach Isaac Brown admitted afterward.
It wasn’t hard to trace Udeze’s impact for when the Shockers were at their best. When WSU jumped out to a 17-5 lead, Udeze had eight of those points. When WSU pounced on K-State at the start of the second half with a 14-5 run, Udeze scored two baskets to contribute.
“I think in the first half, we played inside-out and that’s why we got off to a good start by playing through the big fella and letting him do his thing,” Dennis said about Udeze. “The second half, we did force a lot of contested shots, which are harder to make. I felt like we got away from what was allowing us to win the game.”
“I felt like we got sped up on the offensive end,” Udeze said. “We didn’t take our time. I give all credit to their defense. They did a good job.”
While WSU’s offense bogged down and the guards were left chucking contested, off-the-dribble jumpers, Udeze went largely unused when the Shockers needed points the most.
Udeze has had an up-and-down season to date, but there was no denying he was feeling it on Sunday. Brown has shown he’s willing to ride the hot hand this season with guards Tyson Etienne and Ricky Council IV, but he missed his chance to do the same with his big man on Sunday.
“He’s one of the best players in our conference scoring the ball on the block,” Brown said. “He did a good job when he got the basketball on the block to score. We just got to get the guys around him to score the basketball and shoot better percentages.”
2. Wichita State settled for too many jump shots
A troubling trend has emerged during Wichita State’s notable five-game swing in non-conference play: the Shockers are shooting more and more off-the-dribble jumpers.
When the competition level went up, WSU’s steady diet of catch-and-shoot jumpers was replaced by triple the amount of pull-up jumpers. After averaging just 8.7 off-the-dribble jumpers in the first three games of the season, that number has jumped to 22.8 per game in the last five games.
Against K-State, the Shockers went 6 for 24 on off-the-dribble jumpers for a whopping 25%. WSU attempted a season-high 14 two-point jumpers and a season-low 17 attempts near the rim — not a coincidence.
“I felt like tonight we just took tough shots and when you take tough shots, this is what happens,” Brown said.
So why did WSU end up taking so many tough shots?
A good chunk of the reason is because K-State’s gap defense under coach Bruce Weber was superb. The Wildcats were fundamentally sound, communicated switches flawlessly, made the right rotations and packed the paint to prevent a free trip down the lane for WSU.
K-State played well defensively, but WSU also made it easier on the Wildcats than it should have been. That’s because the Shockers have struggled to properly space the floor for most of this season and those issues came back to haunt them in some of their most ugly possessions in the second half.
For an offense that primarily revolves around ball screens, these spacing issues are becoming more problematic as the season progresses. Too often WSU’s ball handler is unable to take advantage of the screen because WSU’s off guards are either standing too far away from the three-point line — allowing their defender to sag down and prevent dribble penetration without fear of a kick-out shot — or they’re standing too close to the play — allowing their defender to essentially stop the drive and be one pass away for a kick-out shot.
The degree of difficulty is even higher for Tyson Etienne or Ricky Council IV in ball screens because of the lack of shooting gravity around them. K-State had no issue coming completely off WSU’s point guard, either Craig Porter (28.6% three-point shooter) or Qua Grant (26.1% three-point shooter). The Wildcats weren’t particularly worried about Dexter Dennis (23.5% three-point shooter) or Joe Pleasant (four total threes) in the corners.
When Etienne or Council gained an initial advantage in the pick-and-roll game, K-State’s defense immediately collapsed to the paint and they were looking at a wall of defenders. It was an effective strategy by Weber to sell out to stop them from reaching the rim and taking their chances with them pulling from the mid-range and kicking to other shooters.
“Tyson is a great player and we know what he’s capable of,” K-State guard Markquis Nowell said. “We know he has the green light, so we wanted to make other people beat us.”
In the end, Etienne and Council didn’t take a single shot near the rim off a ball screen and finished a combined 2-for-10 on jumpers off ball screens, while WSU never could make enough threes (just 3 of 20 above the break) to make K-State’s defense pay for collapsing.
3. Tyson Etienne has to be more selective
It hasn’t been the start to the season that anyone in the program envisioned for the preseason American Athletic Conference Player of the Year.
Etienne is averaging a team-high 15.6 points, but he’s taking 16 shots per game to get it and the efficiency that made him so dangerous his first two seasons at WSU has plummeted. He’s shooting just 32.1% from the field this season and 28.6% on the nine attempts per game he’s taking from beyond the arc.
Some of the issues stem from the section above, as WSU’s lack of shooting gravity around Etienne has made it harder for him to score in the ball-screen offense. But the star player hasn’t been without fault: WSU’s offense sometimes becomes stagnant with him on the ball and Etienne has attempted too many contested jump shots off the dribble this season.
There are times where Etienne is forced to create off the dribble at the end of the shot clock to bail out WSU’s offense. But there are also times where it’s early in the shot clock and he decides to pull the trigger on an off-balanced or heavily-contested jumper, settling for a high-degree-of-difficulty shot when something better could be available. Against K-State, 11 of Etienne’s 16 misses came off the dribble and were judged by The Eagle as low-quality looks.
“We talked about staying in front of him and don’t give him easy ones,” K-State coach Bruce Weber said. “Even when he made one, it was a tough one. We contested the shots and we stayed in front. Our big guys did a good job in ball screens making him think about it.”
Life is harder on Etienne this season following his breakout year. He has to deal with a level of defensive attention no one else on WSU has to. He faces every team’s best defender, who usually face-guards him. Most teams are switching every off-ball screen, which is limiting his catch-and-shoot opportunities. It’s not uncommon for teams to blitz him when he runs a pick-and-roll, forcing the ball out of his hands. His teammates aren’t knocking down three-pointers at a high clip when he does kick out.
Adding to the frustration on Sunday was the fact that Etienne finished with just two assists, despite leading the team in potential-assist passes with seven. Etienne bends the defense like no one else can on WSU and he found the open shooters dotting the perimeter, but the Shockers weren’t able to capitalize on it consistently.
It looked like Etienne was pressing more than usual against K-State when it came to hunting his shot. And he’s given the green light to do so because he has earned the trust from Brown and the coaching staff. He’s off to a poor shooting start to the season and it’s reasonable to assume frustrations have grown as the shots he practiced and made consistently this summer have not been falling for him so far this season.
But it’s also important to point out it’s just eight games into a 30-plus-game season and Etienne has more than enough talent to turn things around.
WSU’s offense has cracked 1 point per possession for an entire game just once so far this season. In order for the Shockers to realize their offensive potential, Etienne must find a more efficient shot selection.
And the best way to do that just may have come from the mouth of the opposing coach. Even though Weber was talking about his own team, his remarks could easily apply to Etienne and the Shockers for better offense moving forward.
“I keep telling my guys that if they go side to side and make people guard, even the best teams are going to break down,” Weber said. “It’s a problem when the ball gets sticky. It’s got to move. You don’t have to make a play every time you have it. We have enough weapons. If we keep moving it, we’ll make the right plays and we’ll get good open shots.”
WSU’s next four games — all at Koch Arena and all against overmatched opponents — offer a great opportunity for Etienne to start to find a better balance.
4. The Shockers had too many uncharacteristic things happen
Atomic bombs are what former coach Gregg Marshall used to call live-ball turnovers that went the other way for easy points for the opposition.
A team can survive with one or two of them in a game. On Sunday, WSU committed five atomic bombs that led immediately to nine points in transition for K-State.
Giving up those points is even more painful when considering K-State ranked among the worst transition offenses in the country before the game. For a team that struggles to capitalize on fast breaks, WSU essentially gave the Wildcats nine free points.
“It felt like every time we got out in transition, it seemed like we turned it over,” WSU coach Isaac Brown said. “We didn’t have a lot of turnovers, but those turnovers led to layups.”
Turnovers continue to be an issue with this year’s team, as WSU now ranks No. 252 in the country in turnover percentage.
On the flip side, WSU was a top-25 defense at generating turnovers and forcing them on 26% of possessions. On Sunday, WSU was only able to force K-State into seven turnovers — a tick under 10% of its possessions — both season-low marks. The Wildcats outscored WSU 15-10 in points off turnovers.
Perhaps the most uncharacteristic thing from Sunday’s game was WSU’s complete lack of offensive rebounding. The Shockers had been grabbing about a third of their own misses this season, which was vital to the team’s offense because of the amount of second-chance points it generated. On Sunday, WSU grabbed just six offensive rebounds (season-low 15.8%) and was out-scored by K-State 10-3 in second-chance points.
This story was originally published December 6, 2021 at 7:18 AM.
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