WKU Basketball: Keys to Win a Massive Tilt Against Louisiana Tech

Western Kentucky basketball laid two eggs last week. Let’s just be honest there. Sure, it was two road games, and all of the rest of the conference stumbled. The Tops should thank their lucky Red Towels for that. Ultimately, there was no harm no foul.

But what a missed opportunity!

If WKU had just scored about ten more points, the Tops would have swept FAU and FIU and would be sitting atop C-USA with a chance to take down Louisiana Tech at home to take a complete stranglehold. Now, it’s time to beat La Tech or get in some serious hot water in the quagmire of the middle of C-USA.

If WKU loses to La Tech, they could fall as far as a three way tie for third. If WKU wins, they solidify second place and could easily launch into first if North Texas stumbles at UAB or at Middle. That didn’t seem possible until this past Saturday at about 1 Central, when WKU lost the early game of the day and all but two games (and a game between tied teams) resulted in an upset.

La Tech comes into Bowling Green having won four conference road games. Although its best road win was against UAB, this is quite impressive. No other C-USA team can boast of four road wins, so their brand of basketball can legitimately be said to withstand road trips.

La Tech (17–5, 8–2 in C-USA) has won six of seven games, and that one loss was to co-front runner North Texas by one in Denton in a defensive slugfest, 51–50. The Bulldogs can play up-tempo, slow down, and medium paced. They have balance and size, and they are a legitimate basketball team that just doesn’t hurt itself too often. The Bulldogs average 75 points per game while surrendering 61. They shoot, rebound, and assist better than their opponents.

On paper, La Tech seems to be quite a formidable opponent, but then again, they sit just a game apart from the Tops in the standings. Something has to give here.

So what does WKU need to do to beat La Tech?

Keys to Victory

Play With Energy

I hate to use such a generic cliche to victory, but this team can be massively inconsistent. The other thing is that WKU is not favored to win, even though the game is at home. This means the Tops better be on their toes and ready to battle for 40 minutes, or they will likely lose. La Tech is decent to very good in everything. There are very few weaknesses, so being sharp, playing together, diving on the floor, and getting Diddle excited will be absolutely crucial tonight. Who knows? Maybe La Tech will be off. They’ve had a few bad games, but don’t count on it. They’re 17–5 for a reason. More than 75 percent of the time, they’re winning the game, probably comfortably.

Be Better Than La Tech Behind the Arc

Here’s one of the few advantages to tonight’s match-up for WKU: Three point percentage defense. Contrary to popular belief, WKU holds its opponents to right at 30 percent shooting, which is awesome. Whatever they’re doing to stop the three works. La Tech allows opponents to shoot 32 percent from three, but hold opponents way under 40 percent overall. What does that tell us? They pack the paint and allow teams to shoot outside while giving decent effort to stop the three. WKU is different. They stop the three, but allow teams to shoot really well inside the arc. Both strategies work, but they are distinctly different.

DaQuan Bracy is insanely accurate from three, making over 50 percent from deep. Other than that, everyone is average at best, shooting no better than 39 percent. Do a good job on him and things will be looking up for the Tops. Defensively, stopping the three is not a priority for La Tech defensively, so WKU, when open, should bury some threes. That being said, understand their team defensive strategy (which works really well) is to make you shoot outside. Therefore…

Don’t Shoot More Than 1/3 of Shots From Three

WKU takes about 35 percent of its field goals from outside the arc. La Tech forces (really allows) opponents to shoot 38 percent of their shots from three. Basically, they want you to bomb away, so what needs to happen? Penetrate, penetrate, penetrate, and penetrate again. If WKU is not driving to the hole as much as possible, they’re in trouble. La Tech is going to junk it up, clog the paint, and force you to take bad and late shots. Therefore, how do you overcome an inevitable difficulty in shooting? First of all, take good shots. If they’re there, drain your shot. Second of all, draw tons of fouls. Fortunately, WKU is very good in this area if they decide they want to take it straight to the bucket. This tendency can also utterly disappear for entire games, forcing WKU to be ridiculously efficient offensively to win the game.

Make Bulldog Post Players Shoot and Rebound No More Than Their Average

I’m not asking for a superhuman effort here. What I’m asking for is for Mubarrak Muhammed, Andrew Gordon, and Isaiah Crawford to simply not dominate the paint. I think this is doable. One great thing for the Tops is only Gordon (6'10") is taller than 6'8". WKU struggles against massive size. He only plays 10 minutes per game. Muhammed is 6'7" and Crawford is 6'6". One factor that will for sure help the Tops is this lack of size for La Tech. Ultimately, without Charles Bassey, WKU lacks massively in this area.

Perhaps Stansbury can put guys like Jared Savage, Isaiah Cozart, Josh Anderson, or even Carson Williams if need be near the rim defensively and be able to hold their own against guys within a few inches of their height. La Tech does do well on the boards, but with the exception of Muhammed (8.5 rebounds per game), no one is a dominant rebounder. The three players mentioned above are good shooters, all shooting above the team average of 47 percent. If the Tops could just force them to work instead of feasting on lobs and wide open dunks, I think La Tech could struggle to match WKU’s length on the perimeter.

Be Competitive on the Boards

Everyone that follows this team or has seen them play knows WKU will go on some type of run, will have the ability to score at some point, and can shut another team down defensively. What could completely derail a long run or cost the Tops over time could simply be not having enough opportunities. WKU has allowed opponents at times to completely dominate the boards. Sure, part of it has to do with size, but another part is just pure effort and technique. The Tops must be focused on the glass. WKU allows opponents to shoot over 43 percent from the field. A great deal of that has come from allowing the other team to rebound for easy buckets. It killed them in both the FAU and FIU games. It nearly killed them in both of the Marshall games. If it can’t be rectified, it needs to be minimized.

Look for the effort plays on the boards that could win the game for the Tops. I’m telling you, if WKU wins this game, it is going to have to do with several effort plays. Jeremiah Gambrell, Jared Savage, Carson Williams, and Josh Anderson have all made memorable rebounds this season. Can guys like Taveion Hollingsworth and Jordan Rawls contribute on the boards? Jordan Rawls in particular should find a way to get one or two more rebounds per game. He only averages 1.2 per game in 26 minutes per game. This is one of those nights WKU needs a little something from some guys that lack in this area.

Prediction

La Tech is an extremely good, deep, and balanced basketball team. They only have five losses for a reason, and it is not because of a weak schedule, although that doesn’t hurt. They dominate their competition, scoring efficiently and playing really good defense, including cleaning the glass at the end of the possession.

That being said, what is WKU’s number one weakness? Huge size. La Tech does not have it. Therefore, I think this is a team WKU could match up decently against despite not being the better team. First of all, WKU should absolutely slaughter La Tech from the line. The Bulldogs hit 67 percent of their free throws. WKU hits over 78 percent and takes way more than La Tech. This means WKU can have a bad shooting night and overcome it with getting to the foul line.

I really think this is an OK match-up for WKU, and I honestly think Diddle will make the difference. I think the players are treating this game correctly, and I think Stansbury gets up for these types of marquee match-ups. Like the negative side to that or not, this is a huge game and he’ll treat it like it’s a big deal. It’s easy to motivate a team that is not favored, and I think WKU will be hyper motivated for myriad reasons. The Tops will be ready for Louisiana Tech. And I think the crowd will step up and be great. It seems cheesy, but a raucous Diddle crowd changes the outcome of games.

I’ve got the Tops edging the Bulldogs in a heck of a game with tons of exciting plays, Western Kentucky 83 — Louisiana Tech 79.