2010 Missouri Valley Conference Basketball

Wichita State vs Utah State Basketball Recap

Utah State 68, Wichita State 58

Wichita State made one final attempt to gain an impressive victory in the 2010 college basketball season, but the leader of the Western Athletic Conference stood in its way. On an electric night in Logan, Utah, the Shockers' wide-eyed roster got zapped by a clearly superior opponent that made very good use of its home-court advantage.

The Utah State Aggies have set a high standard for excellence over the past decade. Since the 2000 season, coach Stew Morrill's program has won at least 23 games in every college hoops campaign. That display of high-level consistency has given USU a seat alongside Gonzaga and Kansas as one of three most durable dynasties in the sport. Sure, Utah State hasn't reached the Sweet 16 (let alone the Final Four), but since college sports seasons are played primarily within a conference, the Aggies' achievements in the WAC have earned them a lofty place in the world of intercollegiate athletics.

Saturday night, that same Utah State squad decided to turn its attention to a Missouri Valley foe, and after 40 minutes, the home folks had many reasons to cheer.

Utah State wobbled ever so slightly at times but was never seriously threatened in the final 10 minutes of a comfortable win over Wichita. The triumph marked the 22nd victory of the year for the USU crew, which means that an 11th consecutive year with 23 wins is at hand. This 10-point pasting of Coach Gregg Marshall's Shockers also served a more important purpose for Morrill's men: It gave the Aggies a second major non-conference victory this season.

Having defeated Brigham Young more than two full months ago, Utah State can now add this value-rich result to its portfolio and deposit the proceeds in a basketball bank before Selection Sunday rolls around. USU doesn't have the greatest non-conference profile - the Aggies lost to Utah and Long Beach State, after all - but this victory in front of a national television audience should lend a bountiful degree of ballast to the Utah State cause.

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Teams from down-market conferences such as the WAC need to be able to point to quality wins, and USU now owns more than one of them. Provided that the Aggies can avoid bad losses over the remainder of the regular season and then reach the final of the upcoming WAC Tournament, they should be in good shape for an at-large invite to the NCAAs. A loss to Wichita State would have clearly forced USU to win the WAC tourney and make the field of 65 as the owner of an automatic bid, but now, this team's options are open. It can make its way to college basketball's Promised Land in two different ways.

Just how did Utah State silence the Shockers in front of a happy home crowd at the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum? They played their style of ball.

Yeah, that will sound like an empty cliché, but it's true. Utah State's offense flows like the sweetest Mozart melody or the most undisturbed river. On most of their possessions, the Aggies pass the ball several times before contemplating a shot, and they often make a series of passes without allowing the ball to touch the floor. The result of such fluid, team-oriented basketball is that players get open looks at the basket. The second result is that lots of Utah State players get assists. USU made 26 field goals in this game, and on 22 occasions, one Aggie assisted another for the deuce (or, in a few instances, a triple).

A 22-to-26 assist-to-make ratio isn't just good or even great; it's off-the-charts phenomenal.

But it's exactly what Utah State does to opponents. Now Wichita State has discovered just how high-voltage an experience it can be to take the court against the Aggies, a confident and clear-minded team that did all the shocking to the Shockers on Saturday night.

Wichita State will just have to win its own conference tournament to reach the NCAAs. Utah State - thanks to this victory - might have bought itself some leverage when the WAC Tournament rolls around. That's what a breakthrough in the annual BracketBusters event can do for a proud program that shows no signs of slowing down... or winning fewer than 23 games per season.

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer