Wichita State turns up the heat, as AfterShocks deliver first TBT basketball blowout
In their brief time in The Basketball Tournament, the AfterShocks have become specialists in the art of the dramatic comeback and heart-stopping Elam Ending.
There was no need for those skills in Friday’s TBT opener, as the Wichita State men’s basketball alumni team delivered its first blowout victory in its three-year existence in an 83-52 win over We Are D3.
While the game may not have produced the level of theater Wichita State fans have come to expect, the crowd of nearly 4,800 was treated to three straight down-to-the-wire finishes before the nightcap. The victory advanced the AfterShocks to the TBT Wichita regional semifinals against Texas Tech’s Air Raiders at 7 p.m. Saturday.
“It’s nice to not have a heart attack in the process of winning a game,” AfterShocks coach Zach Bush said. “It’s not quite as exciting as the last couple of games we’ve won in here, but shoot, we’ll take it. I don’t think anybody is going to complain about a 30-point win. It’s a little better for our blood pressure.”
The contest looked every bit like a high-level Division I team playing a Division III team, especially in the game’s first four minutes when the AfterShocks had their way with We Are D3 in building a 13-0 lead. The visitors never came within single-digits again, as We Are D3 finished with 16 turnovers, shot 28.4% from the field and made just 6 of 35 three-pointers.
After a Tyrus McGee triple put the AfterShocks on the board, Rashard Kelly applied a one-man pressure, stripped the ball handler and finished with an easy dunk. Seconds later, McGee joined him in the full-court press and poked the ball away again, which led to another basket.
“We didn’t even plan that, it just kind of happened,” Conner Frankamp, a 2018 Wichita State grad, said of the impromptu press. “We got two easy baskets and got out to a fast start and we just kept running throughout the game and it worked well for us.”
“They always say the first game is the hardest with the pressure and it being the first one,” Markis McDuffie, a 2019 WSU grad said. “This makes it a lot easier and lets everybody relax.”
Not only did the AfterShocks build an early lead, maintain it and grow it over the course of the game, but they did so through a balanced scoring attack with 10 of 11 players scoring and six players between nine and 13 points.
Samajae Haynes-Jones scored a game-high 13 points with three assists off the bench, while Darral Willis, who arrived in Wichita on the same day, finished with 11 points and a team-high 12 rebounds. McDuffie chipped in 12 points and five rebounds, while Frankamp added 10 points and four assists, Rashard Kelly scored nine points and was plus-18 in just eight minutes and James Dickey finished with nine points and three steals.
“We got so many guys that can score it and do so many different things, it can be tough at times because it’s like putting together a college all-star team at your own school and everybody now plays a really big role on their pro teams,” Bush said. “Sometimes it’s hard for some guys to give some things up and sacrifice, but these guys do a great job of sharing the wealth and making sure everybody gets some. We like that, opposed to two guys going for 30. I think we’re a little tougher to guard when it’s like that.”
With the game’s drama removed in essentially the first quarter, the only thing that was left to be decided in the end was which player was going to make the final shot in the Elam Ending.
TBT has introduced a new wrinkle in this year’s competition that pays players $1,000 if they are wearing Puma shoes, a main TBT sponsor, when they make the winning shot in the Elam Ending. That’s why as the AfterShocks neared the target score of 83, Dickey and Willis, both wearing Puma shoes, checked themselves back into the blowout game.
“That’s why Darral took it upon himself to check himself back into the game,” Bush said, laughing. “I guess he really wanted that $1,000.”
It was Dickey who earned the extra pocket money, giving a little extra fist pump when he closed out the game with a pair of free throws.
What happened off the court may have held the interest of fans longer than the blowout on the court on Friday, as a power outage along 21st Street on Friday night limited the lighting and air conditioning plus knocked out the jumbotron hanging over center court for the entire first half of the Purple & Black-Lone Star Legends game before the AfterShocks’ game.
It even caused all of the lights to briefly go out during the game, as Koch Arena went completely dark with K-State alum Thomas Gipson holding the ball at the foul line preparing to shoot a free throw before the lights came flickering back on.
Crews from Evergy and Wichita State worked together outside of Koch Arena to find a solution, which eventually restored full lighting, air conditioning and the scoreboard for most of the second half of the Purple & Black game and the entire AfterShocks game.
