Wichita State vs. Tulsa Pregame Discussion 1-13-21

[SkoShox]

-3.5 favorites tomorrow night according to multiple bookies. I think we win, but I wouldn't feel comfortable saying that we cover. Go Shox!

[1972Shocker]

Quotables: Isaac Brown Pre-Tulsa

https://goshockers.com/news/2021/1/12/mens-basketball-quotales-isaac-brown-pre-tulsa.aspx

... Ricky Council IV's development:
"I definitely think (last game was) a glimpse of what he can bring night in and night out. He's a super talented kid. He's getting better defensively. I think now he's starting to understand our system. I just told him early on it, wasn't about scoring to stay on the court. You've got to defend, you've got to execute. When you can do those things, you're allowed more minutes. Now you're scoring. We can see what you can do on offensively. We always knew that he could score the basketball. I mean, he's had signs in practice where he's dominated some days because he's really good off the bounce. He has a lot of confidence. I think he feels like he's the best player on the floor at times. In order to be a great player, you got to have confidence in yourself. And he does have a lot of confidence in himself."

... the keys to beating Tulsa:
"I think No. 1, we've got to try to get out in transition where they can't set the zone up. If we can beat them down in transition on makes and misses and try to attack the rim at that point, that helps us in our scoring. I went back and watched the last game. We scored a lot in transition. If we can't get out in transition and we've got to go against their set defenses, we've got to make sure we do a good job of attacking it. Then we've got to get organized and run our man sets at a full speed. We've got to run our zone sets. We can't just stand. We've got to have a lot of movement. We've got to be able to penetrate the gaps. Then at some point you've got to be able to make a wide-open shot. We got off to a good start versus them the last game because we made four threes early in the game, but the last two games I watched them play, they got out to a hot start. I watched them play South Florida. They got off to a hot start. We've just got to do a good job of getting off to a good start and being able to make wide-open shots."

… if it's this team has room to level up:
"Yeah. I still think we can play better. I don't think we've played a complete 40 minutes yet. Dating back to the Oklahoma State game, the Mizzou game, I thought we played good in halves. In the Ole Miss game, we didn't have a good first half. We played really well the second half. The Houston game, we started out good. We didn't play a great second half. Even the Cincinnati game we played well in the second half, we scored 45 points in the second half. The first half, we were just, OK. I still don't think we've put together a solid 40 minutes. I think we still can play a lot better. I still think we've got a game coming where we're going to get five or six guys who are going to play their best. So, we're still looking for that perfect game where we can play 40 minutes where we can defend at a high level. Hopefully we can put that game together tomorrow."

[1972Shocker]

Speaking of six steps, the announcer seemed convinced Bilau traveled on his fade away jumper. I didn’t agree live or when I watched the replay. I wouldn’t mind if we didn’t hear from that announcer again this year.

Totally agree. Thought the color analyst, a former Penn State player I think, made a total ass out of himself with the 6 steps BS on Bilau. But that announcing team was really poor. Mostly trying to out-cute each other. Didn't really seem all that interested in the game.

[pogo]

Wonder if Sterling will be in attendance

[Stickboy46]

Hopefully this game still happens.

[pie n eye]

Shockm MikeKennedyRulZ Thanks. I thought he had a few interesting takes but overall didn’t seemed more interested in complaining about the game or random broad subjects instead of providing insight into the events on court.

[Shockm]

https://twitter.com/joncrispinespn?lang=en

Jon Crispin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Crispin

[MikeKennedyRulZ]

Speaking of six steps, the announcer seemed convinced Bilau traveled on his fade away jumper. I didn’t agree live or when I watched the replay. I wouldn’t mind if we didn’t hear from that announcer again this year.

Ya, I didn't see a travel on that play either. I believe the analyst, John Chrisman, has Cincinnati ties, but not certain about that.

[pie n eye]

Yikes! That was terrible. Nowadays you can take like 6 steps and not get called.

Speaking of six steps, the announcer seemed convinced Bilau traveled on his fade away jumper. I didn’t agree live or when I watched the replay. I wouldn’t mind if we didn’t hear from that announcer again this year.

[MikeKennedyRulZ]

Holy cow that travelling call on X at 3:30 was colossally bad.

Yikes! That was terrible. Nowadays you can take like 6 steps and not get called.

[RoyalShock]

Holy cow that travelling call on X at 3:30 was colossally bad.

[ShockingButTrue]

Tulsa coming to town with a share of first place on the line? This is not the first time!

40 Minutes of Hell

[wichshock65]

Tulsa coming to town with a share of first place on the line? This is not the first time!

[Aargh]

Etienne is becoming consistent. Gilbert is hot and cold - like most players. Council and Jackson are improving every game. Dennis is going to break out of his offensive slump some time. Tulsa has been good for a couple of years. Haith is a better coach than most on SN give him credit for. Haith is probably better now than he was 5 years ago.

It's not a tough travel for Tulsa to get to Wichita. Home court advantage is going to be pretty small. Win this one and we're challenging Houston for the league title.

KenPom still has some weighting from pre-season projections. Losing over half the scholarship players to the transfer portal and graduation and losing the coach is going to get a pretty negative pre-season weighting in the computer models.

[pogo]

The ESPN Matchup Predictor isn't buying any Shocker stock. 1-4 over the next 5 and 5-10 over the remaining 15.

I'm calling Bull Shite on the predictor 3-2