Freshman DaVonte Lacy Shines as WSU Beats LCSC in Exhibiton Opener

Freshman guard DaVonte Lacy

Last night, the WSU Men's Basketball team played their first game. Now, while this was only an exhibition game against Lewis-Clark State College, I saw some things that put some faith back into my crimson heart after it leaked out in the form of Klay Thompson and DeAngelo Casto leaving the school.

Like I mentioned, this game did not count towards our record or any player stats. LCSC was not able to compete with WSU but let's be honest with ourselves, we would be in some serious trouble if they were able to. I'm not meaning to insult LCSC, they are putting together the best team that they could and trying to match up against a Pac-12 team. I saw some good things from the Warriors in terms of ball movement and trying to get the open look at the basket. Well, enough about LCSC, time to shift our focus to WSU.

Things started out somewhat slow as WSU and LCSC were just trading baskets and trading leads until WSU started to pull away thanks to consistent shooting on their part and poor shooting for the Warriors. Here are the stats from the game:

Player	FGM-FGA	3PM-3PA	FTM-FTA	ORB	DRB	PF	AST	TO	BLK	STL	PTS	MIN	MIN%	TS%
Motum	6-12	0-1	0-1	3	1	0	0	1	0	0	12	21	52.5	48.2
Enquist	1-1	0-0	0-2	1	3	1	0	2	0	0	2	18	45.0	53.2
Capers	2-3	0-0	1-2	2	5	1	4	0	0	0	5	27	67.5	64.4
Ladd	4-10	4-6	2-2	0	3	1	3	0	0	0	14	25	62.5	64.3
Lacy	7-11	3-6	4-4	0	2	2	1	2	0	1	21	22	55.0	82.3
Iroegbu	2-2	0-0	1-1	0	1	0	1	1	0	1	5	5	12.5	102.5
DiIorio	3-4	0-0	0-0	3	2	0	0	0	0	0	6	15	37.5	67.6
Ballard	1-1	0-0	0-0	0	2	1	0	2	0	0	2	10	25.0	100.0
Shelton	2-2	0-0	1-3	0	2	4	0	2	0	0	5	15	37.5	75.3
Kernich-Drew	3-5	2-4	0-0	1	4	4	5	2	0	1	8	26	65.0	80.0
Simon	3-6	2-5	0-0	0	4	1	2	1	0	0	8	16	40.0	66.7
TOTAL	34-57	11-22	9-16	10	29	15	16	13	0	3	88			68.7

First I will look at the team as a whole. I am impressed at how well the team shot. 50% from behind the arc is impressive no matter who you are playing. This percentage will surely drop once the season gets going and when there is some competition that has more height on the perimeter. In comparison to last season, the true shooting percentage was closest to the 84-68 victory over Portland. In that game, the Cougs shot the best that they did for the entire season. Hopefully WSU is able to shoot at or around this level longer into the season. On a bright note, the Portland game was only the 5th best offensive performance that the Cougs turned out last season. This indicates that strong shooting is not essential for a great offensive rating, Coach Ken Bone should be able to get the young kids to perform up to a higher level after some more games.

Some other key things that I saw was how good the hands are of these kids. Great ball movement around the arc and into the post. That being said, having 13 turnovers to LCSC is not a good sign. This could be fixed with some more drills to get the players acclimated to their teammates' positioning on plays. Many of these turnovers were because a pass was sent to the wrong shoulder of the other player. An example of this was when Lacy tossed the ball to Enquist under the hoop when Charlie had just started his roll to the free-throw line and this resulted in a turnover.

One of the main reasons for having exhibition games is to test out all of the new players in game situations and trying out different player combinations. Here are the notes that I took on some of the players:

Brock Motum - I'll admit it, I have a slightly irrational love for Motum. With Casto gone, Motum will have to step up and win more rebounds on both ends of the court. I've been hearing about how he has strengthened up during the offseason, but that was not evident by his one defensive rebound. Even though he does have the ability to shoot threes, I would rather have him play most of his time at the post. His shooting still seems as good as it was last season which bodes well for the team.

Mike Ladd - Ladd showed some promise. His maturity was evident in how he was able to process how to react to different plays from LCSC. I didn't see anything that really put him as a starter once the difficult games start up, however, with Bone giving him the nod last night that could serve as evidence for him being one of the first guards of the bench. With Reggie and Faisal coming back, his spot might be a little further to the right on the bench than it was on Saturday.

DaVonte Lacy - Lacy wasn't really impressing me in the first half. However, in the second half he exploded for most of his points. I'm excited to see how Lacy continues to grow and how he will add to the team this year and next. He reminds me a lot of Faisal Aden at the beginning of last season, if he can keep his confidence high and continue to learn from Reggie and Marcus, I expect him to have a great season. One iffy thing is that DaVonte did get caught up in traffic a lot but that is sort of expected with him penetrating to the hoop.

DJ Shelton - Shelton was pretty average in his play. He reminds me a lot of the other post players that Bone recruits, good shooters but not able to be intimidating/physical enough to box out opposing players. He has the size at 6'10" 240lbs but he needs to use it more. David Wink was brought in for that purpose. By  the time we get to the 76 Classic I expect to see Shelton improve and win some more rebounds.

Dexter Kernich-Drew - Dexter probably impressed me the most out of any of the players, even more than Lacy. On offense he had a team high five assists and also had a 80% true shooting percentage. The spot where he really shined in my eye was on defense. He had great positioning around the perimeter and quickly shifted his mark when needed. In addition to his man up defensive abilities, he is also able to grab some defensive boards.

Based on what I saw last year from the team and a mixture of what I saw from the LCSC game and what I expect to see during the rest of the season, here are my top five at guard and forward in order:

Guard: Reggie Moore, Marcus Capers, DaVonte Lacy, Faisal Aden, Dexter Kernich-Drew

Forward: Brock Motum, Abe Lodwick, Patrick Simon, DJ Shelton, Charlie Enquist

The next game for the Cougs will be against the #23 Gonzaga Bulldogs on ESPN at 9pm Pacific on November 13th.