Why Wichita State’s basketball coach benched two key players for all of K-State game
Wichita State fans may have been wondering where two of the Shockers’ key players were in Saturday’s 55-50 loss at Kansas State.
Kenny Pohto, a 6-foot-11 sophomore who had started WSU’s first seven games of the season, and Jaron Pierre Jr., who was coming off a season-high 13 points against Missouri on Tuesday, both entered averaging more than 22 minutes per game but did not play at all against K-State.
Both players were dressed in uniform and available to play on Saturday, but never did. Why?
A team spokesperson confirmed to The Eagle that Pohto had missed practices ahead of Saturday’s game with an illness. But in Pierre’s case, WSU head coach Isaac Brown made it clear following the loss that he is sending a message with a “coaches’ decision.”
“Those guys determine playing time,” Brown told The Eagle in Manhattan. “That was a coaches’ decision tonight. They’ve got to continue to work. And if you continue to work, at any moment you can get that opportunity.”
The absences of Pierre at shooting guard and Pohto at center against K-State paved way for opportunities for players previously out of the rotation like redshirt freshman Jalen Ricks and sophomore Quincy Ballard.
After playing an average of 4.8 minutes his last four appearances, Ballard logged a career-high 21 minutes and even saw the court in crunch time for the Shockers. He notably made a pair of free throws down the stretch to help WSU rally and finished with four points, three rebounds and two blocks in his extended run.
Ricks had not played since WSU’s second game of the season on Nov. 12, but charted 13 minutes off the bench in Saturday’s game and finished with two points and two rebounds.
Brown said he hopes Saturday’s game will serve as a lesson to WSU’s players about the importance of practice habits. WSU (4-4) has a full week off from games before returning to Koch Arena next Saturday to play Longwood.
“Two guys that normally never play stepped up and had big minutes for us tonight,” Brown said. “I can tell those guys every day in practice, ‘You determine the playing time.’ Next week it could be somebody else.”
The Shockers lost their second straight game of the week in the same fashion: failing to close out victories after leading for almost the entire second half of both games against Missouri and K-State.
Brown and senior leader Craig Porter both said the team won’t break from the demoralizing loss that dropped WSU’s record to 4-4 this season.
“The one thing about those guys is they’ve all got high character,” Brown said. “That loss ain’t going to beat them. We don’t like losing basketball games. We want to fight every game. No one needs to point fingers. We just have to keep practicing and continue to work.”
“We’re trying to stay positive and stay together as a team,” Porter added. “We’ve got a whole new team, so everything is new to everybody. It’s one of those things where you can either sink or swim. I feel like we’re swimming and headed in the right direction. But losing this one, it definitely stings.”
