Despite its success on the offensive end this season, Cincinnati turned to its trademarks of defense and rebounding to pick up a win against Wichita State and reach The American final for the third straight year
by Dick Weiss
MEMPHIS -- Cincinnati put an end to Wichita State’s Cinderella dreams here yesterday, coming up with just enough answers to defeat the sixth seeded Shockers, 66-63, and advance to the championship game of the American Athletic Conference tournament against Houston at FedExForum.
The ESPN matinee will be the national showcase for the two best teams in The American and the perfect lead-in to Selection Sunday, where The American is expecting to once again receive multiple bids from the selection committee.
The 24th-ranked, second-seeded Bearcats (27-6), who have been to three straight championship games, defeated Houston to win the American tournament in Orlando last year, but the Cougars have won both regular season games this season, beating the Bearcats, 65-58, at home and 85-69 in a CBS nationally televised game on the road the final game of the regular season.
In a wild game in which American Player of the Year Jarron Cumberland shot an uncharacteristic 3 for 16 and only scored 11 points, Bearcat coach Mick Cronin still found enough heroes from his supporting cast to survive and advance after Wichita State (19-14), which had won six straight games, rallied from a 62-55 deficit with 4:44 left — making seven of their next eight shots to tie the game at 63-63 with 43 seconds to play.
The Bearcats, who got 13 points from foul-plagued forward Nysier Brooks, 12 points and eight rebounds from Tre Scott, won their 11th of 13 games decided by five points or less when backup point guard Cane Broome, the high scoring transfer from Sacred Heart, scored the go-ahead basket on a driving layup with 23.5 seconds to play. Then, the Bearcats made a game-changing defensive stop on Wichita State’s valuable forward Markis McDuffie, who missed a drive in the paint just before the buzzer.
“The more weapons you have the better chance it’s going to give you to win games,” Cronin said; “You can’t just win if Jarron has a great game and lose if he doesn’t. Nobody can play that way. You’ve got to be able to beat people three ways. Win with your offense—which we did yesterday (against SMU). Today we won with rebounding and good defense.”
Cincinnati out-rebounded Wichita State 42-33 and outscored the Shockers 28-20 in the paint. They limited Wichita State to just 35.8-percent shooting and 8 for 25 from the three.
“Whether it’s today, or this week or next week, the next team you play, anybody who makes the NCAA field obviously won their conference tournament or they qualified,” said Cronin. “I keep telling our guys that the layups are over. So it makes you better when you play good competition.”
Aside from the satisfaction of scoring a quality win against a team that found its way late in the season, Cronin was especially motivated to get Saturday’s victory.
“I wanted to get to this championship game,” Cronin said. “I told the guys that because, in my opinion, Houston is as good as anybody in the country. So, it gives us an opportunity to play a team that beat us twice. That doesn’t always happen in Cincinnati and add to that the fact you’re playing for the championship of our conference. And you get a chance to play against a team that is good enough to win the national championship.”
Cronin was never been afraid to voice his opinion on The American and a perceived lack of respect.
“Keep an open mind (about the conference,” Cronin said. Winning is a big part of it. You have to remember that our first year in The American, UConn won the national championship. So, a lot of (the perception) is preconceived notions. Memphis has a good team, but they will get talked about more next year because of (No. 1 recruit) James Wiseman. He might be the No. 1 pick in the draft.
“I try to tell my guys to find success for yourself. That’s what we try to do. We try to worry about ourselves. Our league’s been great all year. What I will tell you is outside the ACC our league has been as good as any other league. It really has this year.”
Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall, whose team deserves a postseason bid of its own was more than happy to chime in on that subject.
“This is a tremendous league,” Marshall said. “There are no nights off. I mean, we go down to Tulane on the last weekend of the season; they haven’t won, but they gave us all we could deal with. We won on a buzzer-beater by Dexter Dennis and I was amazed at how coach (Mike) Dunleavy kept his team positive through an 0-17 conference record to that point.
“And ECU, with Joe Dooley, they’re going to get better. And the top of the league right now is Houston and Cincinnati. UCF is like playing an NBA team with their size. Temple basketball stands alone. They are certainly in the top 10 in wins all time. Memphis is going to get better. They’ve signed unbelievably talented players. USF is emerging. SMU is coming back and they’ll have a full complement of scholarships. Coach (Frank) Haith and Tulsa, that is a tremendous program. UConn won a national championship and Dan Hurley will have them back in short order.”