WBB: 2023-24 Non-Conference Games

[ShockTalk]

Did I see this right??? Our last FG was with 8:02 left in the game.

[1972Shocker]

Did I see this right??? Our last FG was with 8:02 left in the game.

Yes,. that appears to be the case. The Shocks only made 4 free throws over the final 8 minutes and missed all 11 of their field goal attempts.

It was a brutal game. And it's not like they had a bunch of near makes or rim outs. They were 12-55 from the field and the vast majority of the 43 misses were not close.

Too bad that had to be a home game. It will be interesting to see how SeLa does at KU on Thursday.

[flyingMoose]

I am sitting in the arena thinking, "Talk about the gang who couldn't shoot straight!"

[1972Shocker]

SAINT LOUIS (4-3) vs. WICHITA STATE (3-4)
Friday, Dec. 1, 2023 | 6 p.m. CT
Wichita, Kan. | Charles Koch Arena
TV: ESPN+
Radio: GoShockers.com/Listen with Steve Strain

SCOUTING SAINT LOUIS
> Saint Louis is 3-3 in D-I games with wins over Missouri, Missouri State and UIC and double-digit losses to Drake (by 12), to Wake Forest (by 28), and BYU (by 21)
> Three Billikens are averaging double-digit scoring with Peyton Kennedy leading the team with 17.1 points per game, Kyla McMakin averaging 16.4 points per game, and Brooklyn Gray averaging 12.4.
> Tierra Simon is the team's leading rebounder, averaging 8.3 rebounds per game.
> Saint Louis is ranked sixth in the nation in free throws made per game (19) and 12^th in free throw percentage (81.1).
> The Billikens were picked 3rd of 15 teams in the Atlantic 10 preseason poll, receiving two first-place votes.

---

I don't see the Shocks winning this one especially after their debacle against Southeastern Louisiana on Tuesday. However, in the Shocks defense they were returning from Daytona Beach and due to the snowy weather in Wichita had to spend the entire night in the Atlanta airport before returning to Wichita on Sunday. That plus the lack of significant time to prepare for the game no doubt affected their performance. But I don't think that totally accounts for their poor play.

St. Louis is scoring 75 points a game which doesn't bode well for the Shocks who are averaging 64 points per game and are coming off of one of their worst ever offensive performances.

Winning this game would be a great boost to the Shockers confidence but the main thing is they need to play much, much better than they did against Southeastern Louisiana. A repeat of that performance and this season will be in trouble.

[flyingMoose]

This sounds like another blowout. :(

[1972Shocker]

This sounds like another blowout. :(

At least St. Louis doesn't have the 6-5 center back this season.

[flyingMoose]

Q1: 22-9. I told you so. Oh, wait!

After about two minutes, I could tell this was not the team’72 was describing.


EDIT: Shockers 78-59. Not sure how to explain this one.

[1972Shocker]

RH: Nooner Preaches Defense To Rebound From Disappointing Loss

An early morning practice Wednesday emphasized defense, defense and then more defense.

"We didn't touch a ball," Jobe said.

On Friday, the Shockers handled Saint Louis 78-59 with the complete effort Nooner expects. After no Shocker earned a player of the game award after Tuesday's 64-36 loss to Southeastern Louisiana, Friday's win changed the mood. Jobe got a crown as queen of the court. Thompson grabbed 15 rebounds to earn the rebounding ring. Defensive stopper went to Ornella Niankan.

"We knew that last game – that just wasn't us," Nooner said. "We wanted to get back to our identity."

Nooner talked mostly about defense. The Shockers built a 22-9 first-quarter lead by holding Saint Louis to four baskets and forcing six turnovers.

The Wichita State offense also perked up after struggling Tuesday. Better ball movement. Crisp cutting. After totaling five assists in the loss to Southeastern Louisiana, the Shockers had 15 on Friday, their second-highest total of the season...


"We were moving the ball more," Thompson said. "Which caused us to move off the ball more. Just sharing the ball."

Jobe helped the offense get going with her shooting. She scored 24 points and made 3 of 4 three-pointers. Salese Blow added 17 points, making 8 of 10 foul shots. Daniela Abies scored 14 points.

"We made quicker decisions," Nooner said. "It's no person just having the ball in their hands all the time. Trying to make sure we're moving the ball side to side."

Nooner told the Shockers to play smart, aggressive defense. No reaching to commit silly fouls. The Shockers helped off poor shooters and made it tough on better scorers. The Shockers went 28 of 39 from the line. The Billikens made 8 of 14 free throws.

"Being disruptive, but doing it without fouling," Nooner said. "We don't want people to be able to play one-on-one against us."

After Tuesday's loss, Nooner wanted the focus on defense and coaches doing more.

"I really had to look at myself internally and figure out what can I do to coach them better," he said. "You can't let one game linger. It came down to defense for me."

[1972Shocker]

Kudos to the coaching staff and the Lady Shocker players for the impressive bounce back. IMO that is a good indication of a team with character.

Interesting that after the Shocks imploded on offense the last game Coach Nooner's approach was to stress a strong defensive effort. I like it. Perhaps the best thing I've seen from Coach Nooner so far.

I see that neither DJ McCarty nor Jayla Murray played against St. Louis. Jayla took an elbow across the bridge of her nose against Southeastern Louisianna and DJ has been hampered by a bad knee all year although she has played in every game.

[1972Shocker]

I watched the replay of the St. Louis game. Kind of a strange game. I think basically what happened was the Shocks flipped the scipt on St. Louis and beat them at their own game. St. Louis been beating teams at the free thow line. In their 4 wins this season SLU was 82-101 (81.2%) from the line vs 36-58 (62.0%) for their opponents. In this game the Shocks were 28-39 (71.6%) vs 8-14 (57.1%) for St. Louis.

SLU was also hurt by their top 2 scorers getting into foul trouble with both eventuallly fouling out. Those 2 came into the game averaging 33.5 ppg but only managed 11 points against the Shocks.

On top of that, the Shocks, not a particularly storng rebounding team, outrebounded the bigger Billikens by a whopping 53-37 with 5-9 senior guard Jeniah Thompson grabbing 15 boards. Dani Abies and Ornella Niankan combined for 15 boards as well.

SLU's foul count and the Shockers' free throw count and reboudning advantage were aided somewhat by the decision of the SLU coach to extend the game by jacking up 3s and then fouing the Shocks on the rebound and calling timeouts. SLU was 3-24 on 3 pointers while the Shocks were 4-8.

To all of that add that the Shockers were down 2 starters (McCarty and Murray). BTW, I am all for holding McCarty out until she can get that knee rehabbed to were she can be closer to full speed and be able to have both legs under her.

I don't think this game changes the trajectory of the season much for the Shocks other than if they had produced a second straight stinker like they had against SELA the they would have been in edge of a downward spiral. I think this win kind of gets them back on track to where they were before the SELA game. If and when they can get a healthy McCarty back that could make a difference. Not sure what the issue is with her knee so that may or may not happen soon, if at all.

Still thinking the Shocks will finish the non-con at 6-6.

[1972Shocker]

HOUSTON CHRISTIAN (3-5) vs. WICHITA STATE (4-4)
Monday, Dec. 4, 2023 | 6 p.m. CT
Wichita, Kan. | Charles Koch Arena
TV: ESPN+
Radio: GoShockers.com/Listen with Steve Strain

SCOUTING HOUSTON CHRISTIAN
> Houston Christian is 3-5 win with all 3 wins were against D-III teams. The 5 losses were all on the road to Rice, Sam Houston, Virginia Tech, Texas A&M and Texas Tech.
> The only close was 65-67 to Sam Houston (net 285). The other 4 losses were by an average margin of 48 points.
> Two Huskies are averaging double-digit scoring with N'Denasija Collins leading the team with 12.6 points per game and Kennedy Wilson averaging 10.8 points per game.
> Collins is the team's leading rebounder, averaging 5.3 rebounds per game.
> The Huskies were picked fifth of 10 teams in the Southland preseason poll.

---

In the initial NET rankings for this season the Shocks are ranked #228 and Houston Christian is ranked #352.

HCU will generally have size similar to the Shocks. The do have a 6-5 junior who averages 11 minutes per game off the bench but doesn't score much and looks to be foul prone.

This should be a game the Shocks win. OTOH, HCU's conference mate, Southeast Louisiana dominated the Shocks. Hoping that proves to be an outlier with the exception of Kansas.

If the Shocks play with the same energy as the did in their win of St. Louis they should be okay.

Unknown whether DJ McCarty and Jayla Murray will return to the lineup today. I'm hoping they give time to McCarty to property heal. Whether Jayla plays may depend on if they have acquired a protective face mask for her.

[flyingMoose]

It was ugly. Someone else can tell you how ugly.

[1972Shocker]

It was ugly. Someone else can tell you how ugly.

Earning the Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight moniker?

The Shocks outrebounded HCU 52-31 and stll lost. Tracy Anderson the color commentator on the ESPN+ broadcast said she thought that who wins rebounding would win the game. Shane Dennis said she read his mind. Oops.

If you had the first team to 50 wins you would have been wrong as well. HCU 49 - WSU 44.

The KU game at Koch Arena on Sunday afternoon might get ugly. I suppose Coach Schneider might take it a little it easy on his former assistant but we will see.

Not expecting much of a crowd up against NFL football but would not surprise me if Jayhawk fans don't outnumber Shocker fans.

[flyingMoose]

DJ was available the entire game and was not hindered by her leg issue. Her 11 points led the team.

Ella played extended minutes, and her inside presence was part of the push that got the Shockers ahead by one in Q4 (27-37 to 38-37).

The Shockers missed too many contested chippies under the basket.

[1972Shocker]

A couple of oddities that you don't see very often in this game.

In the 1st quarter the media time out came with about 1:30 left in the quarter after a Shocker foul.

HCU only played 7 players. The 3 of the HCU starters played all 40 minutes and the other 2 played 36 and 33 minutes before coming out of the game with foul trouble. HCU made its 1st sub with 7:37 left in the game when a starting guard picked up her 3rd foul. That sub played a total of 7 minutes. The 2nd sub first came in with 5:38 remaining in the game when an HCU forward picked up her 4th foul. That sub took two 3-pointers and hit them both. One with 5:10 remaining to put HCU up 42-38 and one with 2:33 remaining to put HCU up 47-41. The rest of the HCU team was 3-17 on 3-pointers.

DJ did look the best she has this season and it was the first game she played without the knee brace, although I don't think she is quite at 100% yet.

Jayla Murray did not play again. Apparently, her nose was broken in 2 places and they are still in the process of working on getting her a face mask.

HCU played a defense that played relatively tight on the player with the ball with the other 4 players sagging off. They almost always had 3 defenders with a foot in the paint. I would describe it as an amoeba triangle and 2. Obviously, it was effective. The Shocks may not have the skill set to effectively combat that. The Shocks were 2-11 on 3-pointers.

Overall the Shocks shot 17-61 (27.9%) from the field and 8-16 (50%) from the line. HCU was 21-53 (39.6%) from the field and 2-6 (33.3%) from the line. So the Shocks got 8 more field goal attempts and 10 more free throw attempts (thanks to their 52-31 rebounding advantage including a 22-4 advantage on the offensive boards). But they just could not overcome their poor shooting and also had 18 turnovers to 14 for HCU.

Tre'zure Jobe, the Shocks leading scorer, who has averaged 33 mpg this year only played 25 minutes against HCU and she was not in foul trouble. Most of her time on the bench was the final 15 minutes of the game during which she only played about two and a half minutes. She did have a couple of untimely turnovers during that time. That just seemed odd. Perhaps HCTN wasn't please with how she was playing or perhaps she was felling very well. Tre'zure had 7 points on 3-8 from the field and 1-1 from the line. Tre-zure, Jeniah and Ornella all had 3 turnovers.

Daniella (4-13), Salese (3-13), Ornella 0-6. Jeniah (1-4) and Ambah (1-4) were a combined 9-40 (22.5%) from the field. The rest of the team was 8-21 (38.1%).

I'm thinking the Shocks will be seeing quite a bit more pack-it in the paint defenses going forward.