WSU 91, San Francisco 82: Quick Recap

The Cougars (13-3, 3-0 WCC) continued their unbeaten run to start West Coast Conference play with a win at home that was tenuous for 30 minutes before being put to bed with a monster run that left the Dons (13-4, 3-1) futilely grasping at straws down the stretch.

WSU started the game strong with an 11-0 run off the jump, but USF closed the gap as their scoring machine Malik Thomas went off: 27 points on just 15 shots in the first half, giving the Dons a 1-point lead at the break. The lead volleyed back and forth after halftime, but as we approached the final 10 minutes, USF threatened to open up some space: A Thomas 3-pointer with 10:40 to go put the Cougs down by five.

That’s when WSU came alive. All the fouls that had been piling up in what was a remarkably tightly officiated game started to come home to roost for the Cougars, who relentlessly attacked the paint. The key sequence came with 8:17 to go: Already on a 5-0 spurt that had tied the game, the Cougs found themselves back at the free throw line after Ethan Price was fouled by Thomas going to the rim on an inbounds play. It was Thomas’ fourth, and San Francisco coach Chris Gerlufsen had finally seen enough — with his team having been called for 23 fouls to that point, he got himself a technical.

Price buried all four free throws, and with USF’s top players all in foul trouble, the Cougs could sense blood in the water. WSU strung together a series of stops, focusing on getting the ball out of the hands of Thomas with double teams far from the basket. Meanwhile, Dane Erikstrup supplied the majority of the firepower to put the Dons away: He hit a pair of threes and a couple of free throws as WSU ultimately put together a 23-1 run to turn that 5-point deficit into a 17-point lead with under four minutes to play.

Only a late flurry of free throws and 3s by San Francisco’s deep bench players kept the final margin from being larger.

In A Minute

• Cougfan.com recap via Friend of the Pod Jamey Vinnick

• Stats

• Line o’ the night: LeJuan Watts with 24 points, 12 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 block, 1 steal and — maybe best of all — 1 turnover.

• One stat to tell the tale: The Cougars shot a remarkable 41 free throws, making 34 of them (83%). USF had 23 attempts from the line, making just 16.

Standings

Highlights

Three Thoughts

1. Unreal coaching, again

WSU continues to play its games without four players expected to play major minutes — including NBA prospect and undisputed star, Cedric Coward — and they just keep winning. Let’s try and give this some context.

• WSU — with its full roster — was projected by barttorvik.com¹ as the 84th team in the country.

• When Coward went out after beating Eastern Washington, WSU was ranked 80th.

• Today — after winning 8 of the 10 games since, including on the road at Nevada and Boise State — they are ranked 54th.

• In those last 10 games, they’ve been the 50th best team in the country.

Visually, it looks like this:

After initially struggling for a few games to figure out how to play without Coward (and others), the Cougs reimagined themselves — not dramatically, but enough to play to their new strengths. They haven’t merely survived, they’ve thrived: Five of their six highest game scores² have occurred without Coward; three of those have come without Coward and presumed sixth man-turned-starter Isaiah Watts:

A game score of 87 — last night’s — is roughly the equivalent of playing like the 35th best team in the country in that game. Or, put another way: Like a team that would likely be a 10 or 11 seed in the NCAA tournament.

Hmmmmmm …

Enjoy this, folks. In a year full of absolute shit for WSU sports, this team is fun as hell.

2. Taking advantage of size

If I was a San Francisco coach, player, or fan, I’d have been extremely pissed about the way this game was officiated. But, since I’m not, I get to be thrilled about how it turned out for my team, with unending foul trouble for the Dons and a parade to the free throw line for the Cougars.

For what it’s worth, I think the Cougars deserve a lot of credit for the imbalance. Yes, the officials are the ones who decided they were going to go down the road of calling a chippy game tight, getting tighter and tighter as San Francisco refused to back down. But it was the Cougs who forced the action that led to the calls. WSU had a distinct advantage in size: WSU ranks 34th in kenpom’s “average height” metric, while USF is 131st, and that doesn’t even tell the whole story, as USF’s sole rim protector weighs just 225 pounds. LeJuan Watts, Price, and Erikstrup all go north of that, and with all three on the floor together most of the time, that meant someone was going to have a mismatch in the post.

It’s one thing to have size, and it’s another to actually pull it off. The Cougars were relentless and varied at their approach to getting two feet in the the paint, abusing USF with cuts and post touches: 29 of their 34 2-pointers were dunk attempts or shots at the rim, according to barttorvik.com. Masterful coaching, masterful execution.

3. Cleaning up the errors

One thing about Riley that I’m absolutely sure of is that he has a tremendous ability to communicate the importance of various matters to his team. For example, at EWU, his teams were largely fueled by their explosive offenses; knowing this team would need to play better defense than that, Riley impressed upon them the importance of defending, and they’ve done that on a level far above anything they did in Cheney.

The game at UW underscored the precarious nature of the roster, as foul trouble and sloppy turnovers sunk any chances they had of winning. If WSU was going to have any real chance to sustain its success, they simply had to be better at both keeping their best players on the floor and taking care of the ball.

Mission accomplished, with Erikstrup maybe being the best example. In his career, he has committed 6.6 fouls per 40 minutes. Through the first 12 games, he was right in line with that, getting himself into foul trouble night after night, fouling out five times — “culminating” with his five-foul, 19-minute, 7-point performance at Washington. Since then? He’s played 124 minutes over four games and committed just 14 fouls — a rate of 4.5 per 40 minutes. In the last two games, he’s played 34 and 33 minutes as the Cougs’ top 3-point threat while committing just 3 fouls in each game.

When you’re a big, you’re going to get fouls called on you around the basket just for being around the basket, so it’s imperative to not get the dumb ones. Erikstrup would constantly reach in at the ball, and also body guys 15 feet from the basket. He’s notably stopped doing those two things, and it’s unlocked his greatest ability: Availability.

Up Next

WSU finishes up this three-game home stand on Thursday by welcoming Pacific to Beasley. The Tigers have turned into one of the worst programs in the country since Damon Stoudamire’s departure following the 2021 season. Both kenpom and barttorvik give the Cougs a 95%+ chance of winning.

Tip off is at 6:30 p.m. PT on ESPN+.

1  I realize it can sometimes be confusing when I use both Torvik’s site and kenpom.com for analysis. Their ratings systems are very similar, relying on points per possession scored/allowed, adjusted for the quality of the opponent (aka adjusted efficiency margin) but Torvik’s site allows me to analyze trends over time and drill down into individual games in a way that Pomeroy’s site doesn’t, which is why I’ll sometimes use his ratings instead of Pomeroy’s.

2  A single numeric representation of dominance at Torvik’s site. Read more about it here.