Wichita State plays ‘inspired, connected, intense’ basketball in Memphis win
The snow that blanketed Wichita on Saturday kept many fans at home, but inside Koch Arena, Wichita State played the kind of basketball that has always made the Roundhouse come alive.
Wichita State’s 74-59 win over Memphis wasn’t fueled by hot shooting or a pristine offensive performance. It was powered by grit, physicality and a brand of basketball that has long resonated with Shocker fans — the kind that turns loose balls into momentum, defense into offense and effort into belief.
After stumbling out of the gates in American Conference play, WSU (13-8, 5-3 American) has now won four of its last five games with the lone blemish coming in a road game against the league leader. The Shockers just wrapped up January, once a bugaboo month for head coach Paul Mills, on a three-game winning streak and sit just a half-game back of second place in the conference standings.
If WSU keeps playing like this, the team can expect its largest audience of the season when it returns home for a Feb. 4 game against Charlotte.
“It is not other people’s job to move us,” Mills said. “It’s our job to move them. And the only way that we can move people is you have to play inspired. You have to play connected. You have to play intense.”
WSU had a rather pedestrian offensive showing on Saturday, yet held a double-digit lead for the final 32 minutes and delivered its largest win over Memphis since 2018.
That separation came by way of defense.
WSU smothered Memphis into one of its worst offensive games of the season, holding the Tigers to 40.7% shooting and forcing 17 turnovers. Memphis managed just 0.82 points per possession as WSU dictated the tone with its physicality.
“You’re not going to win the games in the first five minutes, but the tone is going to be set in the first five minutes,” Mills said. “We were assertive, and we were aggressive.”
The tone showed up in plays like in the first half when Memphis guard Will Whorton slipped while trying to make a move and lost control of the ball. Whorton tried to scoop it up on the run, while WSU’s Dillon Battie beat him to the floor, dove on the loose ball and wrestled it away, even drawing a foul in the process. The play ignited WSU’s bench and reinforced exactly who the Shockers wanted to be.
Not long after, the Shockers built on the momentum. Brian Amuneke drove into the paint, came to 2 feet and dumped the ball off to Emmanuel Okorafor for a thunderous two-hand slam. Memphis called timeout as its deficit ballooned to 18 in the first half and Mills stormed onto the court, violently pumping his fist to urge the crowd to get louder.
“When coach Mills gets hype, that means we’re doing a good job,” WSU star Kenyon Giles said with a laugh.
While there is still a loyal core that shows up to games, Koch Arena has too often been less than half full this season. The message from Mills has been clear: It’s not on the fans to create a winning environment — it’s on the team to earn it.
And for a team that looked unsettled just weeks ago, WSU appears to be trending in that direction to earn the fan base’s trust back. Of course, a victory next weekend over rival Tulsa on the road would go a long way in ensuring a large home crowd the next game in the Roundhouse.
“You need to understand that your preparation, you don’t win these games necessarily in the moment,” Mills said. “You’re going to always fall back to the level of your training. We’ve had guys who have approached the past couple of weeks the right way.”
The Shockers’ recent play suggests those lessons are taking hold. WSU has cleaned up its play, responded better to adversity and consistently set the tone with physical play. Senior Karon Boyd said the growth is evident.
“We’re definitely building momentum stacking wins right now, and we’re very proud of our success and how our growth is going,” Boyd said. “We’re making improvements and learning from our mistakes, so that’s definitely a big thing.”
Giles said the recent uptick in winning has correlated with WSU’s commitment to winning the physicality battle every game.
“We’ve made that an emphasis every time we come out,” Giles said. “If we’re the most physical team, we’re going to come out with a (win) every time. When we’re not physical, it’s really hard for us to win.”
The growth hasn’t been limited to effort alone. WSU also showed how far it has come in execution on Saturday.
Early in the second half, Memphis blitzed the ballhandler near half court. It could have been a turnover, but Mike Gray Jr. immediately recognized the coverage and swung the ball to T.J. Williams on the wing. Williams then found Will Berg rolling down the middle of the floor. Instead of forcing a move, Berg stopped on the catch, anticipating the rotation. Sure enough, Memphis’ last defender had come over to stop him, only to leave Karon Boyd wide open in the corner. Boyd read it instantly, cut toward the basket and Berg found him for an uncontested dunk.
In 4 seconds and three passes, WSU broke the defense down completely.
“We still got a long ways to go,” Giles said. “We’re learning and we’re stacking wins, but at the end of the day, this is a hard conference.”
Still, WSU appears to have found something real. The Shockers are playing closer and closer to their potential, and they have forged a clear identity.
“When we bring our physicality, all of the other parts of the game come by themselves,” Berg said. “That’s how we lock in and how we find our identity. I think us winning these last three has been evident of that.”
For a program built on toughness and effort, that identity has always mattered.
“It’s such a team culture thing,” Berg said. “We’re proud to be the gritty, physical team. That’s how we get going, when we make those tough plays.”
Saturday’s snow may have kept some fans from witnessing it in person, but the message was sent: WSU is learning how to win and doing it in a way that Shocker fans appreciate.
Now it’s up to the team to keep earning it. And if they do, the fans should return to the Roundhouse.
This story was originally published January 24, 2026 at 7:45 PM.
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