Four areas that explain what went wrong for Wichita State basketball in Memphis loss
It may seem difficult to take much away from a game where the Wichita State men’s basketball team fell behind by 28 points on its home floor, but there are always fragments to learn from every game.
Every possession is like another sentence in a chapter with every game adding another chapter to the book of this season for the Shockers.
It’s not hard to tell Wichita State played poorly and Memphis played well by the final score line, an 82-64 Memphis win last Saturday. But it’s worth taking a look at why Wichita State played poorly and what the team can learn from it for this week of preparation entering another nationally-televised showdown on Saturday morning, this time at No. 12 Houston.
Here are four crucial areas that help explain what went wrong for the Shockers against Memphis.
1. Wichita State’s mistakes led to easy Memphis points
A staple of Wichita State’s success last season in its improbable American Athletic Conference championship run was limiting turnovers, which not only maximized possessions for the Shockers on offense but more importantly capped how many chances the other team had to attack their defense in transition.
It’s notable that WSU’s turnover percentage has jumped from 15.8%, which ranked No. 29 nationally last season, to 19.4%, which ranks No. 201 nationally this season. Not only is WSU ending about two more possessions without a shot per game, it’s also creating two more potential chances for the opposition to score in transition.
WSU struggled knocking down shots against Memphis and it did itself no favors by turning the ball over 16 times, ending more than a fifth (20.8%) of its possessions without a shot. Making matters worse, WSU committed multiple “atomic bombs,” lingo in the program for the worst kind of mistake (usually a live-ball turnover) a player can make that leads directly to uncontested points for the other team at the other end.
“We gave them too many easy baskets to get their confidence going,” WSU coach Isaac Brown said. “Any time you allow teams easy baskets and they see the ball go through the net that gives them confidence they can make shots.
“We made them feel comfortable early on in the game and giving them those layups early on hurt our defense tremendously.”
Against Memphis, WSU committed at least five atomic bombs that allowed Memphis to score 11 unchallenged points. There were a handful of other live-ball turnovers and ill-advised shots that jump-started Memphis’ attack for transition points.
That’s an easy chunk of points that WSU can avoid by simply making better decisions.
2. The Shockers continue to struggle making open threes
It’s no secret Wichita State is not a good outside shooting team, evident by its 30.8% accuracy on three-pointers, good for the No. 273 rate in the country.
It was always going to be a difficult matchup for the Shockers against Memphis, an excellent defense with an athletic advantage at just about every position to go with elite rim protection.
Could WSU have done a better job of attacking the paint? Probably. Memphis is a foul-prone defense and WSU likely could have forced the officials to make split-second calls on aggressive drives to the rim. But scoring against Memphis’ size and athleticism is no easy task and that very well could have led to low-percentage looks over long limbs and more blocked shots.
It’s easy to look at the final box score and see WSU shot more threes (33) than twos (28) and only made 21.2% of its shots from beyond the arc and assume the Shockers were just chucking outside shots.
However, a film review by The Eagle showed the majority (21 of 33) of WSU’s three-point attempts were either wide open or in-rhythm with a late contest and that WSU made just 19% (4 of 21) of those high-quality looks. For the season, WSU is shooting just 35.6% on unguarded catch-and-shoot attempts, per Synergy, which ranks No. 227 in the country.
“In practice, we do make those shots,” Brown said. “I think in a game we’ve got to realize what is a good shot and what is a great shot and we can’t take quick shots. I think a lot of times when you take quick shots, that gets the other team back on offense. Now we’re down on defense having to guard for most of the game. We’re working on moving the ball, trying to get a better shot and not taking those quick shots when you’re not shooting a great percentage.”
For an offense that sometimes struggles to produce quality looks inside the arc, it’s crucial for WSU to start cashing in on more of these high-quality looks from outside. Right now smart defenses are selling out at all costs to prevent WSU from reaching the paint and allowing WSU to shoot away from outside. The Shockers need to start making defenses pay for leaving them alone on the perimeter, which would improve the spacing for everyone by stretching the defense.
3. Lack of focus cost WSU against Memphis
Wichita State has flirted with becoming an elite defense this season because the team is almost always locked in and makes the opposition work for everything.
Maybe it was because WSU was coming off a 10-day layoff or maybe it was because Memphis started shooting so well, but for whatever reason the Shockers likely delivered their sloppiest defensive performance of the season.
Memphis freshman Josh Minott was hardly in the rotation before the WSU game, but he enjoyed the best game of his young career with a career-high 15 points off the bench. Minott played well, but WSU’s lack of defensive focus played into the breakout performance.
Twice in a two-minute span late in the first half Minott was on the strong-side wing when the ball was entered into the post and he cut to the basket for easy drop-offs for points. Both times WSU freshman Ricky Council IV lost focus for just a split-second, watching the ball in the post, which was all the time Minott needed to cut and launch himself at the basket for a highlight-reel dunk. Those are the kind of easy baskets that WSU’s defense typically prides itself in not allowing.
Another basket was given up too easily around that same time late in the first half on a baseline out of bounds play that ended with the shortest player on the floor, Memphis’ 5-foot-9 guard Tyler Harris, scoring on a wide-open layup.
Instead of guarding the in-bounds pass, WSU instead decided to double Memphis’ star center Jalen Duren to prevent the post-up attempt, which also left no help in the middle of the paint. Memphis called for Harris to come off stagger screens along the three-point line and since the ball was underneath the basket, the situation called for the defender to shoot the gap and try to fight his way to where Harris wound up. Instead, Tyson Etienne chased Harris around the screens and took a wrong angle to allow Harris to cut straight to the basket. WSU’s help defense was late in recognizing what was happening and Harris strolled in for his only basket of the game.
4. Memphis scored in ways it hadn’t this season
Sometimes you just have to tip your hat to another team for rising to the occasion and that seemed to be part of the deal with Memphis.
As detailed above, the Shockers contributed to their demise but Memphis also scored in ways that WSU simply did not think it could.
For example, Duren, Memphis’ 6-foot-11 star freshman, was 0 for 8 on shots outside the paint this season entering the game. Against WSU, Duren made four mid-range jumpers and did so in such a smooth manner that it was hard to believe he hasn’t been doing that all season.
That wasn’t in the scouting report, which is why WSU’s defenders had late close-outs every time. Duren had been a monster all season scoring around the rim and WSU was prepared to try to stop that. Instead, the 18-year-old showed why he’s likely going to be a high lottery pick in this summer’s NBA Draft.
“They had guys not on our scouting report titled as shooters making shots,” Etienne said. “I felt like we had a great scouting report and they just made shots. They had guys step up and make plays.”
On top of Minott’s unexpected performance (he scored 15 against WSU when he combined for 19 points in the eight previous games), WSU was stunned to see Memphis senior DeAndre Williams return to form and drill 2 of 3 three-pointers at Koch Arena. Although Williams had been a good three-point shooter the previous two seasons, he had been ice-cold from beyond the arc (3 of 15) this season.
This story was originally published January 4, 2022 at 2:39 PM.
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