Cincinnati scores a final win in one-sided AAC rivalry with Wichita State basketball
More than a half-century ago, in a final trip to Levitt Arena before departing the Missouri Valley Conference, Cincinnati thumped the Shockers by 27 points back in 1970.
Nearly 53 years later, in a last appearance in the Roundhouse before departing the American Athletic Conference, Cincinnati once again thumped the Wichita State men’s basketball team in a 70-61 win on Thursday to close out what has been a one-sided rivalry.
When WSU joined the AAC in the 2017-18 season, it anticipated going back-and-forth with Cincinnati at the top of the conference. And for the first season, the two proud programs did just that with WSU snapping Cincinnati’s nation-best home winning streak and the Bearcats spoiling the Shockers’ senior day by denying them a share of the AAC title.
But WSU was never able to hold up its end of the bargain in the brief, six-year renewal of the rivalry. Cincinnati improved to 10-2 against WSU with Thursday’s win and its five wins at Koch Arena mark the second-most by any opponent in the last two decades. While the rest of the AAC was just a combined 8-31 at Koch Arena, Cincinnati was 5-1 before exiting for the Big 12 this summer.
None of that history matters much to these Shockers, which have more than enough to worry about with their current state of affairs with an 0-3 start to conference play and with a losing record (7-8) for the first time this season.
“We’re frustrated. Nobody likes to lose,” WSU senior Craig Porter said. “At the end of the day, you can’t really blame anybody besides us. We’re the ones out there playing and doing everything that makes the outcome of the game. At the end of the day, it’s up to us.”
Wichita State used to be nearly invincible at Koch Arena, but sports just a 5-6 record in home conference games in the last two seasons. In just the last week at the Roundhouse, East Carolina knocked off the Shockers for the first time ever and Cincinnati snapped a six-game road losing streak.
Despite matching a 42-year-old school record with just two turnovers (in 61 possessions), WSU failed to capitalize on the extra shots with yet another ice-cold shooting performance: 36% on two-pointers (16 of 45), 27% on three-pointers (6 of 22) and 65% on free throws (11 of 17).
Meanwhile, the Shockers’ defense continued its funk and allowed Cincinnati to peak during the game at 1.40 points per possession when a Mika Adams-Woods triple gave the Bearcats a 22-point lead early in the second half. The Bearcats pummeled WSU beyond the arc with 13 threes, including a 6-for-9 performance from Jeremiah Davenport, who came off the bench for the first time in two seasons and scored a game-high 22 points.
While WSU turned its 13 offensive rebounds into just eight second-chance points, Cincinnati was able to generate 15 points from its 10 offensive rebounds. After consistently holding opponents under 1 point per possession on defense to start the season, WSU has allowed its two worst defensive games to ECU (1.21 PPP) and UC (1.13 PPP).
“One thing you can’t do is when you’re not scoring on offense, you can’t let that affect your defense and I thought it affected our defense tonight,” WSU head coach Isaac Brown said. “The defense can’t struggle and our defense struggled for the second straight game.”
Another brutal half of offense, highlighted by 26% shooting and zero assists on eight field goals, left the Shockers in a 17-point deficit at halftime. The team was playing without starting wing Jaykwon Walton, the team’s second-leading scorer who sprained an ankle in Monday’s practice and did not suit up for the game.
One of the few bright spots for WSU was the superb play of Porter, who appeared to be fully healthy for the first time since spraining his ankle on Dec. 22. The senior point guard played the full 40 minutes, the first Shocker to do that since Markis McDuffie in 2019, and finished with a team-high 19 points on 7-of-15 shooting, a team-high seven rebounds, a team-high three blocks and a steal.
Perhaps the only other positive was Melvion Flanagan, the sophomore walk-on who cleared concussion protocol to return for Thursday’s game and once again provide a jolt to WSU. Flanagan drilled back-to-back threes, then drew an offensive foul on Adams-Woods in less than a minute to help spur a 9-0 run for the Shockers to trim a 22-point deficit to 51-39 with nearly 12 minutes still remaining.
“I just try to come off the bench and give the team something to fall on,” said Flanagan, who added 11 points and is averaging 9.3 points in six games since his unlikely emergence in early December. “They say I’m a spark, so coming in I try to give a lot of energy and that means a lot to the team. I just hope that we can push forward and win some games.”
Cincinnati led by 19 points with less than four minutes remaining, but WSU reeled off an 11-0 run to briefly make things interesting when Xavier Bell connected on a three to trim Cincinnati’s lead to 68-60 with 1:01 remaining. But that was as close as WSU would manage to come in the final 30 minutes of the game.
“When you’re struggling to make shots on offense, that can’t beat you on the defensive end,” Brown said. “You’ve still got to defend; you’ve still got to rebound; you’ve still got to play with toughness. When you give up second shots against a team like that, it’s going to lead to wide-open threes. When you don’t make shots inside the paint on offense, it’s going to lead to fast breaks.”
The bad news is the Shockers are one of just three teams in the AAC left without a conference victory, but the good news is that WSU squares off against both of its fellow winless foes the next two games, beginning with a road trip to Tampa to face South Florida (7-8, 0-2 AAC) on Sunday followed by a home date against Tulsa (4-10, 0-3 AAC) next Saturday.
Cincinnati 70, Wichita State 61 basketball box score
This story was originally published January 5, 2023 at 10:04 PM.
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