More on the HL Tourney

[raiderrunt]

WSU's athletic office working OT
But the Raider staffers don't mind the extra effort a tourney brings.

By Kyle Nagel

Staff Writer

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

FAIRBORN — Matt Liddy used to answer the phone inside his Wright State University athletic department office and dive right into conversation.

"Now it's different," said Liddy, WSU's assistant athletic director. "People will call, and the first thing they'll say is, 'I know you're busy, but ...' "


It has been a hectic few weeks inside the Raiders athletic department as the school's basketball team stormed to the top of the Horizon League standings and took the No. 1 seed in the conference's postseason tournament. Now 22-9, WSU plays host to tonight's HL tournament championship game against Butler with an automatic berth into the NCAA tournament on the line.

Such success changes things, including the duties and lives of those who work inside the newly remodeled halls and offices of the WSU athletic office on the Nutter Center's third floor.

"It really is very exciting," said Mo Cooper, the department's senior woman administrator and academic advisor. "It just adds to everything we do."

Cooper, for instance, has made a few extra calls to players reminding them to stay on track with studies. This is the 10th week of the Wright State academic quarter, and exams begin March 13.

Sara Hill, the department's business manager, has crunched the numbers for a number of scenarios, many of which are unfamiliar to Wright State. What if they need to order championship T-shirts? What about travel and incidentals for the National Invitation Tournament? Even if they lose tonight, the Raiders have already gained a spot in the NIT.

"The coaches can't just stop through here anymore," Hill said. "Everyone wants to stop them and talk about the season."

A season that, recently at least, has ended by now. Instead, the Raiders will play their championship game tonight on ESPN. That means the entire building — not just the athletic department — is involved.

"It definitely makes us want to look good," said John Cox, the Nutter Center's assistant director for operations. "We'll get some extra carpeting down and take extra care in making sure everything's clean. We like the attention."

Attention that brings added responsibility. On Liddy's desk, he has two ready-to-produce postseason brochures, one for the NIT and one for the NCAA tournament. They both took extra work to produce.

But, employees said, that's why one works in an athletic department.

"I was the swimming coach here for 17 years," Liddy said. "When you're a coach, you think something like this must be chaos. When you get into administration, you see that it is."


Contact this reporter at [phone] or [e-mail]

www.daytondailynews.com/s/content/oh/story/sports/college/wsu/2007/03/06/ddn030607wsuscene.html

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Students scoop up free tickets to Wright State championship game
WSU coach buys doughnuts for fans lined up for tickets to tonight's showdown.

By Kyle Nagel

Staff Writer

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

FAIRBORN — Brad Brownell, the Wright State University men's basketball coach, was driving to work Monday morning when he got a call telling him that WSU students were already lined up outside the Nutter Center for tickets to tonight's Horizon League tournament championship game.

It was near 8:30 a.m. when Brownell swung into a local Tim Hortons and ordered 10 dozen doughnuts to go. He was told it would take awhile. "People must not buy 10 dozen doughnuts anymore," he said.


The Raiders won't have to wait long to find out their NCAA tournament fate. If they beat Butler University tonight, they will make their first tournament appearance since 1993.

Win or lose, the Raiders have captured the imagination of their school's student population and the sports-loving community at large. Guided by Brownell, the first-year coach who came to WSU from the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, the team has improved from 13-15 to 22-9 and is the top seed in this year's conference postseason tourney, which it hosts.

Many have credited the turnaround to Brownell's enthusiasm, which led him to disperse the doughnuts to Wright State's waiting students.

"They were fired up," he said. "Free food, you kiddin' me?"


Ticket info

A limited number of tickets are available at the Wright State box office or at ticketmaster.com. Questions? Call WSU's ticket office at [phone].

On TV

Tonight's Horizon League tourney final will be broadcast on ESPN at 9.

[Big D]

Game preview: Butler vs. Wright State
By Marc Katz

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

When: 9 p.m.
Where: Nutter Center, WSU
TV: ESPN
Radio: WONE-AM (980)
Records: Butler 27-5; Wright State 22-9

Probable starters

Butler Pos. Ht. Yr. PPG
Brandon Crone F 6-6 Sr. 11.2
Brian Ligon F 6-7 Sr. 3.6
A.J. Graves G 6-1 Jr. 17.1
Julian Betko G 6-5 Sr. 4.4
Mike Green G 6-0 Jr. 14.3

WSU Pos. Ht. Yr. PPG
Drew Burleson F 6-6 Sr. 8.5
Jordan Pleiman F 6-8 Jr. 7.6
Todd Brown G 6-5 Fr. 8.8
Vaughn Duggins G 6-3 Fr. 9.1
DaShaun Wood G 5-11 Sr. 19.6


Butler bits

A strong start has dissipated for the Bulldogs, who lost three of their final six regular-season games to fall into a first-place tie with the Raiders. Even their semifinal game against Loyola of Chicago was not easy, Butler winning 67-66 in overtime. Sharpshooting junior guard A.J. Graves was held to zero field goals in that game, but scored 12 points, all from the foul line. Raiders will have to be aware of Brandon Crone and Pete Campbell. Both like to shoot 3-pointers.

Wright State

ramblings

Memories of the regular-season-ending loss to Youngstown State are long gone after the Raiders crushed Wisconsin-Green Bay, 67-51, in the league tournament semifinals. DaShaun Wood scored 25 in that game. More importantly, he scored 30 against the Bulldogs in a 77-65 victory Feb. 10. Afterward, Butler coach Todd Lickliter pointed out 12 of those points came from the foul line (at least Graves can match that).

Brownell's take

"Butler's been in a heck of a lot of finals. When it's your first time, you have a few more butterflies. You hope that you settle down and you play well and focus on the game instead of the outcome." — WSU coach Brad Brownell

www.daytondailynews.com/s/content/oh/story/sports/college/wsu/2007/03/05/ddn030607wsuprev.html

[Big D]

IndyStar preview

www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070306/SPORTS06/703060417/1068/COMMUNITIES0404

[raiderrunt]

Here's what's on tap Tuesday night
By Kyle Whelliston
Special to ESPN.com

Three more conferences crown their champions Tuesday night. Here's a preview:

Horizon (Butler at Wright State, ESPN, 7 p.m. ET)
The Horizon League title game is set, and the TV-watching nation at large will finally get a peek at Wright State and star senior guard Dashaun Wood (19.6 ppg).

In coach Brad Brownell's first year in Dayton after leading UNC Wilmington to a CAA title in 2006, Wright spent most of the Horizon season in Butler's shadow as far as the national media was concerned, but wound up earning the No. 1 seed in the tournament. Perhaps people didn't take them seriously because of an 8-6 nonconference start and the 72-43 thrashing the Raiders suffered at Hinkle Fieldhouse in the teams' first meeting, but the tables were turned in a convincing WSU 77-65 win, which helped them earn them the right to host this game.

And the Bulldogs? After assembling a curriculum vitae that included November wins over Notre Dame, Indiana, Tennessee and Gonzaga, they lost three of six to finish the regular season but were given leniency by poll voters, who've kept them in the national rankings. Butler nearly fell to Loyola-Chicago for the second time in two weeks in Saturday's semifinal round, shooting 36 percent from the floor in a 67-66 overtime thriller in which they were bailed out by 94 percent free-throw shooting. They may be known as the Bulldogs, but they're using every last one of their nine lives.

Horizon Tournament bracket/results | Championship Week index




Mid-Continent (Oakland at Oral Roberts, ESPN2, 7 p.m. ET)
Two seasons ago in the Mid-Continent final, an Oakland bench player named Pierre Dukes nailed a last-second 3 to propel No. 7 seed Oakland past a 25-win Oral Roberts team and into the NCAAs. ORU, for its part, was sent packing for an NIT pounding at Maryland. The pain that series of events caused helped motivate the Golden Eagles to a 2006 NCAA berth and a brave fight against Memphis as a No. 16 seed.

Here in 2007, Oral Roberts still dominates the league, but Oakland has evolved far beyond cult heroes and momentary greatness. The No. 2 seed Golden Grizzlies (18-13, 10-4) have four double-figure scorers, are the conference's best perimeter defense team, and stand fifth nationally in free throw percentage (76.2 percent).

They've split the season series with ORU, who will bring the power tandem of shooting guard Ken Tutt (16.2 ppg) and three-time Mid-Con Player of the Year Caleb Green (20.4 ppg, 9.5 rpg) for their final conference game together. Both were sophomores when Dukes hit that shot, and don't think they don't remember.


Mid-Con Tournament bracket/results | Championship Week index




Sun Belt (Arkansas State vs. North Texas, ESPN2, 9 p.m. ET)
You're not going to find another conference tournament as bizarre as the Sun Belt's. First of all, the hosts aren't there -- the No. 12-seeded Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin' Cajuns were eliminated on the road in a campus-site play-in round necessitated by the Belt's swelling to 14 teams (can't we just leave some teams out?). And anyone who took advantage of all the great seats still available saw No. 1 seed and defending tourney champ South Alabama eliminated by No. 9 seed Middle Tennessee State in Sunday's quarters; after storming the league with 13 straight wins, Team USA suffered a four-game losing streak to end its repeat dreams.

That makes No. 2 Arkansas State and its star 6-3 Memphis product Adrian Banks (21.1 ppg) the higher seed in the final. The Indians eliminated No. 3 Western Kentucky last night 80-73 in a game of three acts -- Ark-State won the first and third -- which was performed for an audience of what looked on TV like six people. Dickey Nutt's squad shoots a lot of 3s and defends the paint well, and they were able to salvage a 5-6 nonconference slate with an 11-7 Belt season.

Don't count out the No. 4 seed, the long, lean North Texas Mean Green, though. In a startling case of truth in advertising, the team does wear green uniforms and is quite unpleasant to its opposition, as evidenced by its 22 victories and its status as the nation's ninth-best rebounder (36.6 rpg).

Sun Belt Tournament bracket/results | Championship Week index


sports.espn.go.com/ncb/champweek2007/columns/story?columnist=whelliston_kyle&id=2789388

[raiderrunt]

Wright State going to NCAA Tournament for first time since 1993
Wood scores game-high 27 points to lead Raider upset

BLAKE HALEY
Sports Editor

FAIRBORN -- With the pressure on, DaShaun Wood showed why he was the Horizon League's best player.

Wood nailed a 3-pointer, his sixth of the game, with 1:05 remaining to give Wright State a 55-52 lead, then Will Graham stepped up and made the four biggest freethrows of his life to send the Raiders to the NCAA Tournament with a 60-55 win over Butler.

The victory gave WSU the Horizon League tournament title to go with their regular season crown, and marked the second time the Raiders have advanced to the Big Dance.

"All I was thinking about was finishing with a nice follow through, and I knew that if I could make free throws we were going to the NCAA tournament," Graham said as his teammates celebrated around him. "Really I just wanted to do it for our seniors."

It was two of those seniors, Wood and Drew Burleson that did the majority of the scoring for the Raiders all night. Wood finished with 27 points on 9-of-15 shooting, 18 of those points coming before the halftime break. Burleson did the majority of his work in the second half when he scored nine of his 15 points.

As well as things ended for the Raiders and the capacity Nutter Center crowd, things didn't start off quite that well. Before the fans could get settled in their seats, Butler ran off 10 straight points and grabbed an early 10-0 lead. Wood got Wright St. on the board with a trey at the 16:30 mark, followed by two Wood free throws and a Burleson deuce. Scottie Wilson came off the WSU bench to provide quality minutes and contributed immediately with a rebound and putback. Two more Wood 3-point bombs capped a 15-2 Raider run, and just like that the home team erased a ten-point deficit and turned it into a 15-12 lead at the 10:51 mark of the first half.

Wright St. went on to lead by as many as six in the first half, but an A.J. Graves runner as the first half clock expired trimmed the Raider lead to 31-29 at the break.

For WSU, Wood, Burleson and Wilson were the only three to scratch the scoring column in the first twenty minutes. Wood had 18 points, Wilson scored seven of his 10 points in the first half, and Burleson added six.

With the home fans sensing a trip to the tournament only 20 minutes away, the Raiders came out of the half and tried to deliver a knockout blow. Wood and Wilson both drilled trey's and another trey from Burleson gave WSU their biggest lead of the night, 43-35 with 11:00 left.

But, much to Butler's credit, it would not let the Raiders run away with a tourney berth. Brandon Crone buried two 3s sandwiched around a Mike Green lay-in, and with 7:30 left, the game was knotted at 43. From there, the teams traded buckets for the next handful of possessions, and after a Burleson deuce, WSU led 50-49 with 3:25 remaining.

Graves answered with a 3 for the Bulldogs, only to have Burleson tie it again at 52 with a lay-in at the 1:40 mark.

After a spectacular block on the defensive end from Wood - the littlest man on the court - he came right back down to bury the three that put the Raiders ahead for good and ultimately into the NCAA Tournament.

Crone had a chance to tie the game with 11.6 seconds left, but missed on one of two free throws. Graham then nailed four straight from the charity stripe to ice the win.

"This is great for all the fans that have supported us through out the season, not just when we got hot at the end, but all through the season," assistant coach Billy Donlon said as he watched the Raider players cut down the nets. "Now let's go to the big dance and win a few."

The Raiders will find out their opponent in the NCAA tournament when they gather as a team Sunday to watch the committee name the 65-team field.

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