Ball movement opens Cougar three-point game
Washington State guard TJ Bamba is second on the team in assists after dishing out six in wins over Eastern Washington and Detroit Mercy last week.
AP PHOTO/YOUNG KWAK
PULLMAN – After a 1-2 start to the season, the Washington State men’s basketball team rallied off back-to-back wins in dominant fashion over Eastern Washington and Detroit Mercy last week, where ball movement reigned supreme.
“I think it was a recruiting issue in the past, but we’ve got some between (Justin) Powell, Dylan (Darling), Kymany (Houinsou), Jabe (Mullins), Andrej (Jakimovski), we’ve added some guys that really share the ball, and that gets contagious,” WSU Head Coach Kyle Smith said in a press conference on Tuesday.
In the three wins for the Cougs this season, each of them has seen at least 19 assists. Also in the wins, WSU has turned the ball over 9.6 times per game compared to the 15 turnovers per game in each of their losses. An emphasis on ball movement allows the Cougars to get open threes, which the team set a new program best with last week against Detroit Mercy (19, according to WSU Athletics).
“We are a pretty good ball-handling team against pressure, we got to keep our turnovers down,” Smith said. “We’ve got to really strive to be under 10 every night.”
Through the first five games of the year, the Cougs had three players lead in scoring – Mouhamed Gueye led against Texas State, TJ Bamba led against Boise State and Prarie View A&M and Mullins led against Eastern and Detroit Mercy.
“I feel pretty confident that we’re an unselfish team as far as they don’t really care who scores, and I think that starts with our leadership,” Smith said. “(Mouhamed Gueye), TJ (Bamba) and now Justin is on the floor leadership.”
Smith said that moving the ball and creating assists is something he hopes will be the team’s identity as they prepare for two conference games before shifting back to non-conference play.
“It’s a little bit of our identity, I hope,” Smith said. “The two scrimmages we played, and the last two games and Texas State, so five out of seven games we’ve been good. Went on the road, got punched a little bit by Boise, we competed well, and Prarie View, they just outplayed us from tip to final horn.”
Ian Bivona may be reached at ibivona@columbiabasinherald.com.