Men's Basketball | 2/28/2017 10:00:00 AM
STORYLINES
Wayne State will be playing in its first GLIAC Tournament since the 2012-13 season and enters the playoffs as the league's fifth-seed. WSU will travel to the U.P. for the third time this year and play at fourth-seeded Michigan Tech. The Warriors won four of their last five games, including a 3-1 road trip highlighted by a 68-47 victory at MTU. Tiebreakers prevented the Green & Gold from hosting a quarterfinal matchup as a loss at Lake Superior State on Feb. 18th loomed large.
THE SERIES
WSU leads 54-31 in the all-time series against Michigan Tech in a series that began in 1927. Starting in 2009, the Warriors won five straight before the Huskies captured the next four meetings. Wayne State snapped that streak last season with a 77-64 victory in Detroit. WSU is 18-20 in Houghton, Mich., and Coach Greer is 12-11 in his 16 seasons vs. the Huskies. MTU won the season's first meeting, 63-58, in Detroit before the Warriors responded with a 21-point win in Houghton on Feb. 9th. The teams have met three times in the postseason, including two GLIAC Tournament games. WSU won a GLIAC Tournament title in 1999 over MTU and the Huskies advanced to the GLIAC Semifinal in 2002 with a win over WSU.
SCOUTING THE HUSKIES
Michigan Tech enters the playoffs at 15-13 overall and 13-8 in league contests. The Huskies had lost four of five before edging Northern Michigan at home last Thursday. Kevin Luke, the winningest coach in Michigan Tech basketball history, is in his 23rd season leading the Huskies. MTU is led by two of the more prolific scorers in the league as sophomore forward Kyle Monroe is scoring 19.7 points per game and freshman guard Tommy Lucca is averaging 16.3 points per night. Senior guard Jordan Chartier is shooting 44 percent from three-point range, and averaging 13.3 points per contest. Sophomore guard Bryan Heath is contributing 12.9 points per game, while shooting over 90 percent from the free throw line. As a team, MTU is averaging 74.7 points per night and allowing 72.4.
ALL-GLIAC RECOGNITION
Two Warriors were recognized with all-league honors as announced by the GLIAC on Feb. 27. Junior forward
Chuck Key was voted to the All-GLIAC First Team, while graduate student
Michael Lewis was selected to the All-GLIAC Defensive Team.
LAST TIME OUT VS. MICHIGAN TECH
Wayne State earned a key GLIAC North Division win, 68-47, at Michigan Tech on Feb. 9th. The wire-to-wire win was WSU's first victory at MTU since Jan. 17, 2013. The Warriors took an important first step in securing their first trip to the GLIAC Tournament since the 2012-13 season. The Warriors sprinted out to a 10-0 lead four minutes into the opening half powered by eight points from
Chuck Key. WSU continued to execute offensively and led 16-4 after a
Clark Bishop jumper at the 13:30 mark.
Ronald Booth connected from deep with three-minutes left to play to put the visitors up 30-18. A Bryan Heath triple at the 2:47 mark snapped a four-minute scoring drought for the Huskies.
George Spencer hit WSU's third three-pointer of the half to give Wayne State a 33-21 advantage with 38 second to play. At halftime, the Green & Gold led 33-23, propelled by a 52 percent (13-for-25) shooting percentage. Wayne State scored the first seven points of the second half to lead 40-23 and held MTU without a field goal until the 15:05 mark of the stanza to make it 45-27 after a
Marcus Moore a trey. Moore connected from behind the arc once again to add to WSU's lead, making it 52-32 with just under 11 minutes left to play. Despite going nearly five minutes without scoring, the Warriors led 57-36 at the 10-minute mark. With 4:33 to play, WSU was up 61-42 after two free throws from Spencer. Wayne State would coast to a 68-47 victory.
COACHING MILESTONE
With the win on Dec. 3rd over Hillsdale,
David Greer became the winningest coach in the 99 years of Wayne State men's basketball. He passed his predecessor Ron Hammye's mark of 212 victories, which he collected in his 13 seasons (1988-01).
NCAA STATISTICAL RANKINGS
In the latest NCAA stats release (Feb. 26th), WSU ranks 19th in scoring defense (66.6 PPG), 14th in fewest turnovers (294), and 44th in both opponent field goal percentage (.422) and turnovers per game (11.8).
WINNING STREAKS
The longest winning-streak in program history is 17 games done on two occasions in 1955-56 and 1994. Other streaks of note include 14, 12, and the nine-game winning streak for this year's team is one of four in program history and the longest since 1998-99.
ELITE DEFENSE?
Wayne State is allowing 66.6 points per game this season, which is the best mark in the league and is tied for 23rd in program history (lowest since 2012-13 / 66.3 PPG). Opponents are shooting .422 against WSU this season, which is the best defensive performance since the 2008-09 team limited opponents to a .418 shooting percentage.
WHO WILL LEAD THE WARRIORS?
Three Warriors are averaging more than 10 points a night.
Chuck Key has taken the team lead at 14.8 points per game over
Ronald Booth's 14.3 points per contest.
Marcus Moore is contributing 12.3 points per game.
20-POINT WINS
WSU has collected six 20-point victories this season, including a 23-point win over Northwood on Jan. 26th and a 24-point win against Lake Superior State on Jan. 28th.
REBOUNDING ADVANTAGE
WSU has steadily improved its rebounding efforts all season long. The Warriors have won the rebounding advantage in 13 games this season (plus three contests were equal). The largest being a 42-23 rebounding advantage at Northern Michigan on Feb. 11. Wayne State ranks sixth in the GLIAC with 37.1 rebounds per game and third in terms of offensive rebounds per game at 11.8. The Green & Gold rank fourth in rebounding margin at plus 3.5 per contest. That rebounding margin ranks 18th in program history and is the best since the 2011-12 season posted a plus 4.5 mark.
COMCAST/XFINITY
Every home men's basketball game in 2017 was aired live throughout the state of Michigan on Comcast/CN 900.
LIVE ON WDTK
Kevin Brechmacher will call every contest live on WDTK - The Patriot (1400 AM / 101.5 FM). Fans can also stream the action online newstalk1400.us. WSU alum Kendall LeSure, who played at Wayne State from 2000-04 and scored 1,068 points during his career, joined Kevin for home games.
