Wichita State at Houston Game Thread

[TheShocktocles]

Need to keep JE in the game. Solid effort with many contributors tonight. The future is looking bright!

JE could stay in the game if he didn't make so many dumb fouls. Fouling a player shooting an off balanced shot with 3 seconds on the shot clock is just dumb. Dumb Dumb Dumb. I like his heart but he has got to play smarter.

[ShockerFever]

Two relatives of a current player commented on a Taylor Eldridge article on Facebook mentioning the selfish play of the team tonight. Two things: 1) If I were said player I would certainly not want my relatives to make those sort of public statements. 2) It's been hinted at all season that there may be some chemistry issues with this team and this is more proof, imo.

Hmm, have a link?

[AndShock]

It's a Taylor Eldridge shared article in The Shocker Faithful group. I'm actually not sure how to directly link to it. They might not even be talking about any players in particular and just be talking about the team as whole but when I read selfish play there's a couple people who come to mind.

[wusphlash]

40% shooting inside the arc isn't gonna win many games.

[Aargh]

I'll jump into the McDuffie crossfire.

If McDuffie would take the shots he should be taking and pass the ball on some of the shots he shouldn't be taking, he'd probably be averaging about 2 points less per game, but the team would probably be averaging about 6 more points a game.

[Stickboy46]

I'll jump into the McDuffie crossfire.

If McDuffie would take the shots he should be taking and pass the ball on some of the shots he shouldn't be taking, he'd probably be averaging about 2 points less per game, but the team would probably be averaging about 6 more points a game.

It's not even the direct points from those passes that's most important. It's the confidence gained by the rest of the team

[forevershockerfan]

The Shocks made a gallant effort on the cold and lonely road from start to finish against the 17th ranked Cougars. Grrrr!!! Our 4 centers, Ude, Mit., JE, and Pooh Bear all had off nights. At times we seem like we are getting it as a team, and then our inconsistent play and lackluster shooting kicks in. It was good to see Brown play well in the 1st half. DD led our team in rebounds with 6 and has a nose for the ball and has had some of our biggest and needed rebounds this Season. From late in the 1st half on into the 2nd half our beloved Shocks could not shoot the rock in the net, and the rest is history. Compounded with that was we again made too many turnovers tonight.

Houston had more firepower tonight and got hot with some uncontested 3's in the 2nd half. Houston's top 4 scorers in this game outscored our top 4 scorers by 9.. The Cougars had 5 more assists, 4 more steals, 4 more blocks and shot the ball better. Our schedule is not getting any easier so the Shocks will have to scratch and claw every step of every game to pull out a winning record from here. I'm still hoping that we have wiggle room for improvement this Season and can turn some of these games into wins and get some of our key players primed and ready for this remaining Season in hopes next Season will be a better Season. We need some shooters and scorers in here next Season and it appears not only do we have some incoming, but an educated guess is we will be signing more players in the late signing period as well. Keep fighting Shocks. We have lots of games yet to be played this Season. It's not over until it is over and we the SN faithful will stick with our beloved Shocks through thick and thin.

[ShockerFever]

It's not even the direct points from those passes that's most important. It's the confidence gained by the rest of the team

And I'll even piggyback one step further.

Imor's all bent about the points by SHJ and MM. Well, you know why that is? It's because those two are the ones shooting all of the shots. Marshall has said the offense must run through them so of course they are gonna have higher PPG averages. That doesn't mean they're "leading" the team or they're not replaceable. It's just something Marshall has chosen, for some reason, to play this year. Assist numbers are way down, wins are way down, everything is completely backwards. The two players taking the majority of the shots causes the rest of the offense to sputter and probably takes a toll on chemistry too. SHJ and MM are incapable of taking a bad shot according to Marshall. I've never seen more airballs and backboard balls in my life than I have with this team. Is that what you want the younger players to take from? A bunch of selfish 1 on 1 ball. FVV and LS weren't the only ones handing out assists on their respective teams. Those teams all played unselfish and like units. Even without that quality of PG, it's still possible to be an unselfish team. We have deviated so far from that this year and I think is greatly attributing to the L's.

Just because SHJ and MM are leading in scoring, doesn't mean jack ****. If JE was given the ball as much as those two, he'd be averaging 30 a game. The PPG crap is irrelevant.

[Dan]

SHJ and MM are a couple of the only guys that can get shots off. Nobody can feed the post so that rules out those guys, Burton and Torres are scared to shoot, ES and DD haven’t figured it out yet but they will eventually. I was glad to see RB get aggressive and try to make some things happen. We need more of that from some of these other guys.

[Dan]

Just got back from the game. I was proud of our guys effort. Saw some positives that we can build on. We wil lose a lot more game but I can tell you this - nobody will want to play us as an 8 seed come conference tourney time.

[AndShock]

I'll jump into the McDuffie crossfire.

If McDuffie would take the shots he should be taking and pass the ball on some of the shots he shouldn't be taking, he'd probably be averaging about 2 points less per game, but the team would probably be averaging about 6 more points a game.

Even if we didn't score off of secondary options as compared to some of SHJ's and MM's dumb shots, them not taking the shots would still be a positive. Multiple shots every single game where no one on offense is ready and the opposing team gets a fast break with no one to stop them. We'd be better served by them chucking the ball out of bounds. I just don't see how this hasn't been nipped in the bud or noticed on tape yet. It's absolutely ridiculous.

[ShockerFever]

Even if we didn't score off of secondary options as compared to some of SHJ's and MM's dumb shots, them not taking the shots would still be a positive. Multiple shots every single game where no one on offense is ready and the opposing team gets a fast break with no one to stop them. We'd be better served by them chucking the ball out of bounds. I just don't see how this hasn't been nipped in the bud or noticed on tape yet. It's absolutely ridiculous.

Great point.

I would love to be a fly on the wall when they're going through tape. It's completely mind-boggling.

[Aargh]

I was expecting a 30-point beatdown like we got against OU. Losing by single digits is much better than I was expecting. This is probably the first game this year where the result has been better than my expectations.

The final result against Temple was about what I was expecting. How we got to that result also fit my expectation of what we could expect this year - inconsistency and the inability to close out games. That is the common theme for first-year players.

The substitution patterns tonight indicate some things have been changing in practice. Rod Brown made the best of his opportunity.

[Blackmag]

Taped delayed the game. Went about like I hoped it wouldn’t. Led pretty much the whole first half, showed a lot of fight. But they made the fourteen point run draining 3s. We could have folded but we kept fighting to get back and make it interesting. We had no post play tonight, too many silly fouls. Mitguard did what he could considering he rarely plays. Poor Bear and Echenigue got frustrated with some of the calls. I liked how our freshmen guards played tonight as a whole. Won’t get much easier but hey wait till next year, right?

[another shocker]

no.. the year after next year

[TheShocktocles]

40% shooting inside the arc isn't gonna win many games.

Totally agree. MM and SHJ make mistakes and sometimes take bad shots. " WE KNOW THIS " But we got nothing from our bigs in this game. Not a good game from JE, IPBC and MU. And our transition defense was terrible in the second half. They got wide open threes and they made them.

[Shocker1976]

Loved the Shockers first half play; after the 14-0 run in the second half I picked up a book to read but kept the live stats and Kennedy call on my computer. I don't understand why Marshall continues to coach the second half the way he does.

My only comment on this game.

[forevershockerfan]

All in all, it appeared to me that the Shocks surprised Houston and the TV commentators as to how close we did come. Yes, the 2nd half continues to be a struggle this season for the Shockers. Going by memory, it seemed like we only shot 2-12 on the final shots of the 1st half or we would have had even a bigger lead. Then Houston had a 14 -16 point run to kick off the 2nd half and the Shocks had no time-out or answer for this onslaught that continues to hinder us this Season. Not many teams will defeat Houston at Houston in the AAC. Even so, the Shocks are facing a Conference that is better from top in bottom than even last Season in my opinion.