Stutz leads Wichita State to NIT final

In the bigger college basketball picture, Tuesday night's NIT semifinals may have qualified as a consolation prize, played out before a sparse Madison Square Garden crowd by teams visiting from as far as 2,170 miles away.

But it will bring big headlines in The Sunflower, Wichita State University's student newspaper, after the Kansas school walloped Washington State, 75-44.

Alabama nipped Colorado, 62-61, in the wild second semifinal, yet another reminder that the NIT may not be March Madness, but these four teams at least have danced with the stars in some form or other.

During the past regular season, both Wichita State (Virginia Commonwealth) and Washington State (Butler) were beaten by the NCAA's most unlikely Final Four participants. Alabama's coach is Anthony Grant, who recruited the core of VCU's stars-in-the-making during his three seasons as coach in Richmond. And Colorado was the team widely considered to be unfairly passed over so as a small token of respect for another non-BCSer.

But, bingo: Here was another so-called mid-major, Wichita State of the Missouri Valley Conference, sticking it to a power league representative. Just like in that other tournament.

Wichita State never trailed, never had its growing lead threatened in the least. The Shockers traumatized Washington State both offensively and defensively.

Wichita State's 7-foot junior Garrett Stutz came off the bench to lead all scorers (24) and rebounders (11). Washington State junior Klay Thompson, who set a school single-season scoring record (22.0 average) this year, made only 1 of 10 field goals, missed all five of his three-point attempts and, limited to 25 minutes by foul trouble, scored six points.

"These kids were very disappointed," Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall said. "They wanted to go to the NCAA Tournament, felt like they could be a very good team in the NCAA Tournament. Just didn't work out for us. But here we are in New York with a chance to play for a championship."

And he reminded that New York shouldn't be too surprised. He mentioned the one-point loss to VCU in February, and that Wichita State led UConn for 37 minutes before losing in November.