WSU verus Western Kentucky predictions and pregame discussions

[Play Angry]

Greetings Shocker fans. I am a fan of WKU and have been reading over this thread. I wanted to bring to light a couple of misleading things regarding the previous two seasons rankings that I have seen posted.

2 seasons ago WKU replaced their coach Ken McDonald mid-season. He had inherited a sweet 16 team and ran it into the ground. Next to Matt Kilcullen this was probably the worst coach the Hilltoppers have ever had. McDonald was replaced by assistant coach who was made interim coach for he remainder of the season. For those of you who aren't familiar with Ray Harper. He has an .831 winning percentage (363-760) across all divisions. Harper has coached in 9 national title games and has won 4 national championships (2 in NAIA and 2 in DII). Simply put the man just wins. He took over a WKU in rebuild mode as interim coach and after a little more then a month was given the reigns full time. WKU then proceeded to rattle off win after win in route to a conference tournament championship and NCAA appearance beating Mississippi Valley St in the opening round before falling by 15 to eventual national champion UK in the 2nd round.

Last season the WKU roster was severely depleted with injuries. 7 players missed game action last season and several played through nagging injuries. In spite of that WKU's roster got healthier at the right time towards the end of the season and once again won the Sun Belt tournament championship and made the NCAA tournament.

Until this season Coach Harper has not been able to institute his offensive and defensive full court tempo game because of lack of depth. This is no longer and issue. I am simply stating that if you judge this WKU team based of numbers from the last two seasons then you may be setting yourselves up for disappointment if the game is close.

Having said all of that I have no idea what to expect as far as the outcome of the game. You guys have a very talented team and I expect that you will probably come out with the victory. However, do not expect a run away game by any means. I will be shocked (no pun intended) if it is a run away game.


Any questions you all have about the Tops feel free to ask. I will try and answer to the best of my ability.

Best of luck tonight

Polite and informative fans of opposing teams are always welcome here. Thank you for the nice synopsis of your squad.

We will be rooting you on all season, with an exception for tonight.

[WuDrWu]

Greetings Shocker fans. I am a fan of WKU and have been reading over this thread. I wanted to bring to light a couple of misleading things regarding the previous two seasons rankings that I have seen posted.

2 seasons ago WKU replaced their coach Ken McDonald mid-season. He had inherited a sweet 16 team and ran it into the ground. Next to Matt Kilcullen this was probably the worst coach the Hilltoppers have ever had. McDonald was replaced by assistant coach who was made interim coach for he remainder of the season. For those of you who aren't familiar with Ray Harper. He has an .831 winning percentage (363-760) across all divisions. Harper has coached in 9 national title games and has won 4 national championships (2 in NAIA and 2 in DII). Simply put the man just wins. He took over a WKU in rebuild mode as interim coach and after a little more then a month was given the reigns full time. WKU then proceeded to rattle off win after win in route to a conference tournament championship and NCAA appearance beating Mississippi Valley St in the opening round before falling by 15 to eventual national champion UK in the 2nd round.

Last season the WKU roster was severely depleted with injuries. 7 players missed game action last season and several played through nagging injuries. In spite of that WKU's roster got healthier at the right time towards the end of the season and once again won the Sun Belt tournament championship and made the NCAA tournament.

Until this season Coach Harper has not been able to institute his offensive and defensive full court tempo game because of lack of depth. This is no longer and issue. I am simply stating that if you judge this WKU team based of numbers from the last two seasons then you may be setting yourselves up for disappointment if the game is close.

Having said all of that I have no idea what to expect as far as the outcome of the game. You guys have a very talented team and I expect that you will probably come out with the victory. However, do not expect a run away game by any means. I will be shocked (no pun intended) if it is a run away game.


Any questions you all have about the Tops feel free to ask. I will try and answer to the best of my ability.

Best of luck tonight

Do you anticipate an up tempo game from the Hilltoppers? Do you think they'll pick up full court? I'm asking because I what I remember of the KU game in the tourney last year was not an up tempo game. I suspect the coach implemented a game plan that he felt had the best chance of succeeding on that day, the sign of a very good coach imho. Just curious what kind of game plan you anticipate.

[Play Angry]

The number of fans giving away or selling their tickets for tonight is very encouraging. Props to those folks for making sure we can have a packed house tonight.

[Rojogrande]

Do you anticipate an up tempo game from the Hilltoppers? Do you think they'll pick up full court? I'm asking because I what I remember of the KU game in the tourney last year was not an up tempo game. I suspect the coach implemented a game plan that he felt had the best chance of succeeding on that day, the sign of a very good coach imho. Just curious what kind of game plan you anticipate.

I suspect it will be a lot more up tempo then what you witnessed last year vs the Jayhawks. We will full court press with trapping along the sidelines from time to time. But I imagine it will mostly be a lot of full court man to man from the PG spot. The Tops finally have the athletes and the depth to be able to get out and run this season. However, I don't think we will be nearly as fast paced this game then what you might see at the end of the season. We have 2 players out with foot injuries in starting PG Brandon Harris and backup PF Okaro Akamune. We also have 2 transfers PG Chris Harrison-Docks (Butler), and G Trency Jackson (Texas Tech) who will not be eligible until our game against Louisville in December. Those are 4 players that would be playing a fairly decent amount of minutes tonight if they were healthy/eligible. Jackson would probably even be starting along with Harris.

The KU game was masterful coaching by Harper. He used our 6'7" George Fant to draw Withey away from the basket and take him off the dribble. If the Tops could have dropped a quarter in the ocean that game we would have come away with the W. Western was far from a 16 seed talent wise last season. Injuries can really bring a season down.

[Spaulding]

If the end time of a basketball game that starts at 10PM local on a weekday is not considered fairly late, then you are either: A.) a college student, or B.) a loser.

...or an alum and die hard Shocker fan who happens to live in southern California.

[Kung Wu]

Interesting. I wonder how effective the full court press will be this year with the new rules. The initial trap will still be effective, but once the pass is made the defense is in a particularly bad way this year. Once that pass is made the defenders have to delay, and that's particularly challenging now. I'm guessing the new rules will cause coaches to back off of the full court press pretty quickly, with their defenders hand cuffed. I hadn't really thought of that 'til now.

[ShockerFever]

Injuries can really bring a season down.

We had 3 starters out for 85% of the year last year and we made the Final Four.

[Rojogrande]

Interesting. I wonder how effective the full court press will be this year with the new rules. The initial trap will still be effective, but once the pass is made the defense is in a particularly bad way this year. Once that pass is made the defenders have to delay, and that's particularly challenging now. I'm guessing the new rules will cause coaches to back off of the full court press pretty quickly, with their defenders hand cuffed. I hadn't really thought of that 'til now.

You know I have thought the same thing. Teams like Louisville who press hard or VCU with their HAVOC defense may have their hands tied a little more this season. I know a lot of coaches are already up in arms over the new rule. WKU has been working in practice on trying to play defense with their hands behind their head to try to avoid hand checking as much as possible. Let us hope tonight's game is more about the players and less about the refs blowing their whistle.

[Rojogrande]

We had all 5 starters out at different points. One lost for the season, and another kicked off the team. Plus you guys had more talented depth and were not coming off a horrible coaching hire. Credit to the Shockers though. They stepped up and did what they needed to do.

[Kung Wu]

You know I have thought the same thing. Teams like Louisville who press hard or VCU with their HAVOC defense may have their hands tied a little more this season. I know a lot of coaches are already up in arms over the new rule. WKU has been working in practice on trying to play defense with their hands behind their head to try to avoid hand checking as much as possible. Let us hope tonight's game is more about the players and less about the refs blowing their whistle.

Yes we also press from time-to-time. It'll be interesting if that tactic ends up going dormant now that the real season is underway.

[SHOCKvalue]

...or an alum and die hard Shocker fan who happens to live in southern California.

Was speaking to casual college basketball fan, not WSU fan/alum.

[The 'hut]

Will someone be lucky enough to sit by the Crazy Hair Lady! lol

Look, I never...ever..make fun of hair.....signed Follicularly Challenged.

[bunck]

Chad Bishop@MrChadBishop11m
Ray Harper is 11-7 as WKU's coach in nonconference games and 5-15 overall with WKU on the road.

[1979Shocker]

Follow tonight's Wichita State game livve on Twitter

http://www.kansas.com/2013/11/11/3111105/follow-tonights-wichita-state.html

[1972Shocker]

The number of fans giving away or selling their tickets for tonight is very encouraging. Props to those folks for making sure we can have a packed house tonight.

Now, if we can just make that a habit for every game.