Opponent Watch 2019-2020: Wichita State

After one of the most challenging and rewarding seasons of his career, the timing of an attractive offer to go elsewhere could not have come at a better time for Wichita State. Marshall has rebuilt his roster and is optimistic after the Shockers won 14 of their final 18 games. He will lose just one senior after next season.

He told no one outside of Kresse and his immediate family of the offer, and instead of using it as an opportunity to get more money or years on his contract, he decided he was content and told Arkansas no.

“It would take something like that for us to leave, and I don’t know that we will ever leave,” Marshall, 56, told The Athletic . “But at the same time, we haven’t buried our head in the sand. We don’t say we’re absolutely never going anywhere.”

But as the years pass, it looks more and more like Marshall will stay where he’s happy and loved.

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Football coaches haven’t figured it out yet, but basketball coaches are. Better money doesn’t mean a better situation.

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Big loss for the Shockers. Allen was a transfer from WVU and was considered to be a strong offensive player…nickname was Teddy Buckets.

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Man they always get good OOC games. Despite last year this add was a slam dunk for the AAC. Great fans great arena great program. Schedule did us no favors 2 years ago when we were their AAC opener. It was like Oregon last year opening FC yeah right we’re not losing this game.

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I agree with you they bring value and competition. Their first year they looked strong. Hoping they make tournament this year

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Marshall signed five freshmen and a junior college forward. He has only one senior and two juniors on scholarship, meaning the Shockers once again will be one of the youngest teams in college basketball. But the vibe around the program is much different. Last year he told those close to him he’d be satisfied if his team finished above .500. Now the expectation is to get back to the NCAA Tournament.

“We understand a lot of things that we didn’t get at the beginning, like how hard we need to play and how valuable the ball is,” senior center Jaime Echenique says. “We really matured at the end of the year to understand how hard we had to play and how hard this program always plays.

“Last year all of us new guys, it wasn’t easy for us. These new guys are learning really quickly.”

Man, I’d love for @JosephDuarte or @HRReview to do something like this with Alan Bishop (if the staff allows that kind of access).

At the start of the summer, Wichita State strength and conditioning coach Kerry Rosenboom sat down with each men’s basketball player and designed a summer workout plan.

Now that summer workouts have concluded and the players have the next few weeks off before classes at WSU start on August 19, Rosenboom gave The Eagle an update on each scholarship player heading into the 2019-20 season.

" 8. Trey Ware – Wichita State

JUCO school: South Plains

Another player who went the JUCO route after a coaching change, the former UTEP forward became a sought-after prospect after putting up 13 ppg and 6.8 rpg for the juggernaut South Plains team. At 6’7, Ware showed the ability to play both the small and power forward positions for the Shockers. And with West Virginia transfer Teddy Allen not with the program anymore, there’s an even bigger need for the JUCO newcomer to have a big impact.

Ware also will be one of the most experienced players on the roster as well, one of just three underclassmen. So not only will he have to provide on the court the production, he’ll have to be one of the leaders for the team as well. There’s a lot of unknowns for Wichita State next year but Ware’s play could answer a lot of questions about their collective ceiling."

" 4. New group of Shockers for Wichita State

After seven straight years of 25+ wins and making the NCAA Tournament, Wichita State took a step back in their second year in the AAC. Moving up from the Missouri Valley Conference was expected to be somewhat tough for the program after their former stars graduated.

The hope now is that the underclassmen core from both this year and last year’s recruiting classes are good enough to get the Shockers back into contention. For this group of newcomers specifically, it’s filled with five three-star recruits, along with wing Trey Wade, one of the top JUCO commits in the class.

Tyson Etienne and Grant Sherfield are a pair of talented combo guards that some recruiting outlets have classified as four-star prospects. Noah Fernandes is more of a pure point guard that’ll provide good perimeter depth. And to add more frontcourt talent to replace the graduated Markis McDuffie are forwards DeAntoni Gordon and Josaphat Bilau to round out the group. None of these are projected early NBA Draft prospects but there’s some real talent in this group that can be developed into All-Conference pieces in a few years.

Now in the AAC and could be dealing with a future juggernaut in Memphis, Wichita State will certainly have a tougher time at consistently making the Big Dance. Head coach Gregg Marshall has always been known as an excellent developer of talent and he’ll need to continue that with a completely new roster filled with Shockers."

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everybody got better but outside of Grimes our additions were ignored.

WSU got progressively much better by the end of last season. A sign of good coaching. They’ll be a handful this year

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