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Three Questions about Wichita State

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Oklahoma State will welcome the Shockers of Wichita State to Stillwater this Saturday. It’s the biggest home non-conference game of the season and honestly, outside of Bedlam and Kansas, one of the biggest of the year, period.

**Side note: OSU should have a home game like this every year, not matter how good or bad they are. Lose? Whatever. Win? It benefits the program so much.**

I spoke with Taylor Eldridge, who covers the Shockers for the Wichita Eagle. We talked about the senior-heavy team, why this will be a strength-vs-strength matchup, and what kind of impact OSU’s solid perimeter defense will have on the outcome.


Phillip Slavin: Wichita State has been a solid program, a preseason top-10 this year. It’s a senior-heavy team this year with recognizable names like Shaquille Morris and Rashard Kelly. Who are the leaders for the Shockers this season?

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Shaquille Morris [USATSI}

Taylor Eldridge: This is one of the most veteran teams in college basketball. They have six seniors in their rotation right now. They’re playing nine, sometimes ten players. they’re missing their leading rebounder and scorer from last year Markis McDuffie, but this team doesn’t rely on just one guy so they’ve been able to get by with their incredible depth.

Shaq Morris has probably been the biggest force so far. Landry Shamet is a name that a lot of college basketball fans have heard by now. A lot of national people are picking him to be that “All-American” type for the Shockers. He’s not a guy that’s going to put up crazy stats, but you watch him play and, he’s just so poised and always makes the right basketball play.

Then there’s Conner Frankamp, a sharp shooter. He caught fire against Baylor. Rashard Kelly is the “All-American” glue guy. He’s not going to put up crazy stats, but he’s going to get you eight, nine rebounds and three steals, two blocks, a couple of charges. He really helps hold this team together. Rauno Nurger coming off the bench, 6-10 guy. Great guy off the bench. Zach Brown is their go-to defender. They stick him on whoever they feel is the best offensive threat on the other team. They’re loaded and they have so much experience.

PS: Last year, OSU went on the road and blew out Wichita State. This year the game is in Stillwater, but the Shockers have already proven they can win on the road after knocking off Baylor in Waco last weekend. What did WSU do to win that game?

TE: The question coming out of Maui was, “How are they going to play against the zone defense?” They had a 16-point lead against Notre Dame at the half before the Irish switched to a zone defense. After that, WSU completely fell apart on offense and could not score the ball. Notre Dame rallied and, a lot of stuff had to happen outside of that, but Notre Dame comes back and steals that game from WSU. So going up against Baylor’s 1-3-1 zone, Wichita State moved the ball much better.

Instead of settling for those contested three-point shots, they were able to find the soft spots on the baseline and the middle and really work the ball out, and play inside-out. Also rebounding. WSU came in statistically the No. 1 rebounding team in college basketball. But they were up against a Baylor team that — as OSU fans know — is super long and super athletic. WSU was able to play them to about an even draw on the boards. WSU makes rebounding such a focus.

What really impressed me in that game was, Baylor came out in the first 5-6 minutes and they were grabbing a ton of offensive rebounds. Then WSU settled into the game and kept them off the glass. I think WSU held them to their second lowest offensive rebounding performance percentage-wise of their season. That’s the big thing for WSU is their rebounding and defense.

I know Oklahoma State is a really good defensive team. Really good man defense. They don’t play a zone as much. That will be interesting to see how that matches up on Saturday, because WSU just shreds man-to-man defense. I think they’re in the 99 percentile on synergy against man-to-man defense and against zone they’re just average. I’ll be interested to see how much zone Oklahoma State plays. It will be an interesting strength-vs-strength matchup.

PS: Speaking of defense, Oklahoma State’s strength has been it’s perimeter defense. So far they’ve held all but one team below their season average from beyond the arc. What kind of impact do you think that will make on Saturday?

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[USATSI]

TE: In Maui, WSU did not shoot the ball very well. They shot less than 30 percent from 3 in those three games. It was bizarre because this is a really good shooting team. They shot 40 percent as a team last year, so they were probably one of the best 3-point shooting teams in basketball.

Most everyone from last year came back, so this team has a lot of potential. They showed what they can do against Baylor shooting over 50 percent (62.5 percent to be exact). It was because they were working the ball inside-out, being aggressive inside. Obviously it helps when Conner Frankamp hits 4 of 5 from 3. When he’s on, Wichita State’s offense gets taken to another level.

This is a team that doesn’t overly rely on the 3-point shot. I don’t think they’re taking a lot of 3s compared to the rest of college basketball. So if you take that out of their game, it’s not going to kill them, but it definitely limits the ceiling of how high this offense can score. I think that’s obviously going to be something that’s a focus for Oklahoma State. However, this is a WSU team that can find other ways to win.

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