Intensity rises as conference play begins
Raiders in Green Bay today for tough league matchup.
— The grind of FAIRBORN conference play has begun for Wright State, and that means expectations are greater even in practice.
“I just noticed Coach D is more intense,” junior guard Joe Thomasson said of Billy Donlon after Friday night’s Horizon League opener at the Nutter Center.
The Raiders (9-6, 1-0) defeated Detroit 70-57 after a week of practice following a 100-55 loss at Ohio State. Whatever practice the Raiders were able to squeeze in before tonight’s league game at Green Bay (11-3), it surely had intense moments.
But this is not a team Donlon gets after a lot. Before playing Detroit he said he wanted his team to get over letting offensive struggles lead to defensive letdowns.
“Coach was positive in practice a lot,” Raiders leading scorer JT Yoho said. “And if we made a mistake, he would just say next play. So I think that really helped us out a lot.”
The Raiders started slowly against Detroit and trailed 13-4. So Donlon called time out and reminded his team to keep playing defense.
“I thought we were going into our rut of poor offense leading to poor defense,” he said. “If you don’t guard in our league, you don’t win.”
That statement will be tested tonight against the Phoenix, who are expected to win a second straight league title. This will be their league opener, and they haven’t played since New Year’s Eve.
“Certainly we’re going to play a team that has been terrific all season,” Donlon said. “We’ll have our hands full, but we’ll just go up there and try to control the things we can control.”
Donlon likes that he has a team that has plenty of players who can score. Yoho averages 17.0 points and Thomasson 11.8. At least five others are capable of scoring in double figures. Against Detroit, three were in double figures and two scored nine. Yoho said he was happy to see others get more involved.
“I think it makes it hard for the other team to decide what do you want to do with certain individuals,” Donlon said. “You can decide as a philosophy to take away the three, to take away the drive, to take away the post-up. But to try to take away players it’s hard because so many guys can score. And we want our guys to try to go make plays.”
Green Bay leans heavily on senior guard Keifer Sykes. He’s averaging 17.2 points and is the reigning league player of the year.
The Raiders are confident that the confidence gained Friday will continue to grow in January.
“We just picked up our focus level because we Horizon League play Friday with a 70-57 home victory over Detroit behind 18 points and eight rebounds from JT Yoho and 62.1 percent shooting in the second half. ... Center Michael Karena is coming off one of his best games with 14 points and five rebounds in 22 minutes. ... The Raiders’ highest national ranking is No. 98 in the RPI. Their strength of schedule rates 94th. ... The Raiders were picked to finish fifth in the Horizon League preseason poll.
This is the league opener for the Phoenix, the preseason pick to win a second straight Horizon League regular-season title. ... Their highest national ranking is No. 52 in the RPI. Their strength of schedule ranking is 130th. ... The Phoenix are led by Keifer Sykes, last year’s Horizon player of the year. Sykes averages 17.2 points, 4.4 rebounds and 3.6 assists. He shoots 47.4 percent from the field, 32.3 percent from 3-point range and 77.5 percent from the free-throw line. ... Junior guard Carrington Love was last week’s Horizon player of the week after averaging 22 points in two games.
The Raiders travel to Youngstown State at 7 p.m. Thursday. know we’re a talented team,” Thomasson said. “We haven’t really played up to our expectations yet. So hopefully we got
the wheels rolling.”