Wednesday, December 7, 2016 7:00 p.m.
Gentile Arena, Chicago, Ill.

The Wright State Raiders were picked to finish fifth the the Horizon League preseason poll. They're coming off two recent road losses, at Penn State and Georgia State, which have dropped their season record to 5-3 against Division I teams. Their only other loss was a home defeat against Toledo. But WSU isn’t just a team that benefits from home cookin’ at the Nutter Center—they kicked off the season with an 85-81 win against SIU in Carbondale, and trailed by only three at halftime at Penn State.

Coach Scott Nagy’s four guard, one forward starting lineup has been unchanged all year. The Raiders are led by 6’5” junior guard Mark Alstork, who is all over the court and will get much of the defensive attention. Alstork was a preseason 2nd teamer, and is averaging 21.6 ppg even after being held to 15 points (on 3-of-18 field goal shooting) against Penn State. He leads the team in minutes, points, points per game, assists, turnovers, free throw attempts, free throws made, free throw percentage, and foul outs. Alstork shoots less than 40% from the field, just below 40% on both three pointers and including two point attempts. Yet he’s deadly from the free throw line, shooting 85.9% from the stripe on 85 attempts (more than twice as many shots as anyone else on the team).

The other starters have a more equal share in the offense. Six-eight senior forward Steven Davis averages 14.8 points per game on 54% shooting from the field (including 46% from distance), but despite his size averages only 4.0 rebounds. The main work on the boards comes from 6’3” junior guard Grant Benzinger (13.7 ppg, 6.6 rebounds) and 6’4” junior guard Justin Mitchell (10.2 ppg, 7.2 rpg). Senior guard Mike La Tulip out of Prospect High School in Arlington Heights is a great ball handler who chips in 8.3 points, almost all of them (57 points out of his 75 points on the season) coming via the three-point shot, where he knocks down 46.3%.

Only three additional players have appeared in more than half the games for the Raiders: Parker Ernsthausen is a 6’11” sophomore forward averaging 4.3 points and 2.1 boards; sophomore guard Mark Hughes contributes 3.0 points and 3.3 boards; and 6’7” freshman forward Ryan Custer plays about 10 minutes. Unless the game is safely out of hand, you won’t see any other Raiders.

WSU is a team that likes to run, shoot, create some chaos, and look for matchup problems. Their shooting percentages aren’t very high, but they get to the line quite a lot (72 times more than their opponents, and connecting at a very high 76.6% as a team). They’re better than average three point shooters (39.7% as a team), but they fire up a lot of them, helping to make up for low effectiveness near the basket. You won’t find a lot of teams at this point of the season with four starters having made more than 30 three point attempts, and three having made more than 40.

The Ramblers need to control the tempo against the Raiders, who according to kenpom.com play the 45th fastest pace in Division I. Wright State averages 79.0 points on offense and likes to play in the 80s, while Loyola prefers games in the mid to upper 60s.

Despite Alstork’s gaudy numbers, the Raiders’ success is more closely tied to the group play of the other four starters. The Raiders have lost with Alstork scoring 39 (against Toledo) and they’ve won with Alstork held to only five points in 32 minutes (against North Florida). Keeping Alstork off the free throw line and the other four starters from reaching double figures in the scorebook is the best way to beat Wright State. Maybe more attention needs to be given to the three point shooting defense, since the Raiders are happy with the three point trigger finger. Loyola also needs to play with the kind focus and energy they had against San Diego State—it hasn’t been a problem yet this year, but sometimes after winning a big game the Ramblers have been known to get blindsided by their next opponents’ determination.


Loyola game notes: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/loy ... 202aaa.pdf

Wright State game notes: http://www.wsuraiders.com/ViewArticle.d ... =211338991

TV/Streaming video: http://www.espn.com/watchespn/index/_/i ... olachicago

Vegas odds: Loyola by 7.5

Another great preview. Reading between the lines seems like this will not be a walk in the park and we will have to play well and pay attention to detail. Coming off a big win will test our ability to keep focused. Will be interesting to see who they put on Alstorek....my guess is Richardson or Doyle.Coach Moser is a pretty good defensive minded coach especially when he has a chance to prepare and the team has some practice time.

Throughout writing the preview, it was clear that there will be some match up issues, because their players have skill sets that are different from their body types. You have their leading scorer and assist-maker (on a team that doesn't get a lot of assists because they're usually scoring in transition) at 6'5", which is Aundre Jackson's height. Their best three point percentage shooter is 6'8" Steven Davis--- who, despite being their tallest and heaviest (220 lbs.) is fourth among their starters in rebounds per game. The two that worry me are Benzinger and Mitchell, who rebound a lot, have the capability to score a lot (both average in double digits), and there's going to be a height advantage for those two guards.

I think another aspect Loyola will have to capitalize on is the turnovers. We've done a great job limiting our turnovers in the past several games. There are three players on Wright State who are turnover machines: Alstork (48 TOs in 287 minutes), Mitchell (29 TOs in 262 minutes), and Hughes off the bench (16 TOs in 179 minutes). I would maybe like to see these guys get trapped some, as maintaining possession limits their game.

Interesting to see Mike LaTulip starting and doing well for Wright State. I lobbied for Porter to at least take a look at LaTulip after the former walk-on at Illinois announced he would sit out his senior year at Illinois to preserve a year of eligibility and then transfer as a grad student.

These previews always make me anxious about other teams strengths; great stuff JCT. This is an interesting game for sure... I'd argue we came out somewhat sleepy against Alcorn last week following the tough game against NC State and with a team that has potential to score like this it'd be good to get on top early.

It'll also be important again to get more good minutes out of Vlatko with Donte's continued absence. I was really happy with how he performed last week against a tough team; in the past some of our reserve bigs would over think and miss easy shots; but Vlatko's proven to be dependable at cleaning up second chance points and making open layups. Nothing spectacular, but it's hard to find a solid offensive big man to come off the bench.

http://wrightstate.proboards.com/thread/3038/attendance-problem

Looks like WSU is having similar attendance issues when it comes to students and the advanced age of it's core fan base. They had some interesting ideas when it comes to attracting more students.

Some examples:

Wilt Chamberlain---Jockey

William "The Refrigerator" Perry----Lingerie Model

Aaron Hernandez----Mediator and Life Coach

Spud Webb---- Papal Swiss Guard

I do believe the difference between WSU and LUC is we can and DO run and DEFEND !! We beat SDS with primarily defense Plus we ran and ran against the rest

I like our chances here !!

guys, i have not been on your board since you left the horizon. it seems like the mvc is agreeing with you and you are doing really well. congratulations for that. the raiders new coach is bringing some excitement back to the program. he is currently working with all bd recruits plus the Illini transfer, latulip, who has done well. raider fans look forward to coach Nagy doing for the raiders what he did in South Dakota.

i think the two teams have similar styles and it should be an interesting matchup.

in the past i remember a poster on your board, maybe brotbrit. Not sure about that name. is he still around??

well, good luck the rest of the season and congrats on your program's development. but of course for tonight it I'd "GO RAIDERS!!!!!!!! keithfromxenia

We are now at game time 8 point favorited up from 6 early in week, I believe !!

We must tend to business , Make Raiders play us NOT the other way around !!

RUN RAMBLERS !!