College Basketball

Wichita State jockeying for undefeated season — and respect

Midnight has yet to strike for Cinderella. Last March’s magical Final Four run, in fact, may just be the start of Wichita State’s fairy-tale story.

The Shockers enter the regular season’s homestretch as one of two undefeated teams left in college basketball — Syracuse is the other — with a series of gritty comebacks and impressive performances lining their résumé.

“I think one really runs hand in hand with the other. The 25-0 start is a derivative of what we accomplished in that run last year,” Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall said in a phone interview. “We’ve been playing one-and-done basketball for a while. Now that we got this streak going, you lose and the streak’s done. It’s kind of been that way for a while. Our guys have thrived in that type of environment.”

Fourth-ranked Wichita State is emblematic of the gutsy, blue-collar city in Kansas it represents. Marshall spent nine years at Winthrop, reaching the NCAA Tournament six times, and the members of his staff did their time in the junior college ranks.

The team’s star, Cleanthony Early, went from a Division III JUCO to landing on the Wooden Award Watch List. Small forward Ron Baker paid his way for a redshirt freshman year at Wichita State, after his only two scholarship offers in high school were from South Dakota State and Arkansas-Little Rock. Shooting guard Tekele Cotton was lightly recruited.

“We haven’t had the peachiest road to get here,” said the multi-faceted Early, a 6-foot-8 NBA prospect who grew up in The Bronx and hails from Middletown. “We’ve seen struggle, we’re not in the worst position in the world. People are going through far worse situations. We’re really blessed to be in that position, playing a game that we love. This is everything I lived for. This is what I asked for. This is what I dreamed of. That’s our attitude, and that shows.”

The Shockers hear the talk of an undefeated season everywhere — on social media, on campus, in talking to reporters. It’s impossible to ignore, particularly now that they have entered the final stretch of the season. Just six Missouri Valley Conference games stand between Wichita State matching the 2003-04 St. Joseph’s team, the last to finish off a regular season with a perfect record. The players talk about it among themselves, but it is far from a rallying cry.

“We hear about it and we think about it, but we don’t try to let it consume our minds,” Early said. “We’re happy to be here, and we’re hungry and humble at the same time. We’re having fun with it.”

Marshall said: “We talk about winning the next game. We’ve talked about that now 25 times so far this year.”

Marshall is quick to point out Wichita State wasn’t healthy last year, one reason it entered the NCAA Tournament last year as a 9-seed and lost six games in the conference. Baker missed most of the season, returning from a stress fracture in his right foot in March, while several others missed a handful of games.

Among the Shockers impressive wins are victories over SEC foes Tennessee and Alabama, a win over bubble team BYU, and a road victory over No. 13 St. Louis, the class of the rugged Atlantic 10. St. Louis head coach Jim Crews was impressed by Wichita State’s versatility, its ability to score in a variety of ways and defend on the perimeter as well as in the paint.

“I think their greatness is their balance. They don’t beat themselves,” said Crews, whose team has won 16 straight games since the Dec. 1 meeting with the Shockers. Early is the Shockers’ leading scorer, at 16.3 points per game, but four others average at least eight points per game.

There is debate regarding where Wichita State should be seeded in the tournament if it does run the table. ESPN analyst Jeff Goodman tweeted the Shockers shouldn’t be a No. 1 seed, and many question their level of competition, having played just one ranked opponent. Furthermore, the Missouri Valley Conference was weakened by this season’s defection of Creighton to the Big East.

CBS Sports Network analyst Steve Lappas said knowledgeable basketball minds believe the Shockers are as good as anyone in the nation. He pointed to their defensive prowess (holding teams to 39 percent shooting), rebounding acumen (a plus-8.4 margin) and the frequency with which they get to the free-throw line (26 times per game).

Crews said “they would do extremely well” in any conference in the country.

“They can win a national title,” Lappas said.

Early and his teammates enjoyed the hoopla from their memorable Final Four run a year ago, but once the summer came around, they began to focus on this season, wanting to create new memories.

“I don’t think we’re trying to forget about last year. We’re trying to leave last year where it’s at, and at the same time, do what we’re trying to do this year,” Early said. “Now … we still have so much of the season left to capture and take advantage of.

“It can be better. We have a chance to make it even more special, and that’s awesome to be able to talk about.”