ST. LOUIS, Mo. — Several weeks back, a friendly debate broke out in the Wichita State basketball offices, with head coach Gregg Marshall on one side of the aisle, and assistant coach Chris Jans on the other. Somebody in the room had floated a simple question:
So who was the Shockers' most valuable player?
One camp went with big Carl Hall. The other leaned toward smooth Cleanthony Early. Both choices seemed obvious, and both completely worthy. (Again, this was a friendly debate.) Lines were drawn. Arguments were made. Rebuttals flew back, then forth, then back again.
But you know what? After Saturday night, kids, we're demanding a recount. Because there's a darned good case to be made for somebody else in the WuShock Clan: senior point guard Malcolm Armstead.
"The point guard, in this system, is the big key," guard Demetric Williams said of Armstead, whose 15 points helped the Shockers (26-7) club Illinois State, 66-51, and advance to Sunday's Missouri Valley Conference Tournament championship, a rematch with rival Creighton. "When our point guard is playing well, we tend to play well."
Besides the usual pesky defense against the Redbirds' backcourt trio of Tyler Brown, Johnny Hill and Bryant Allen, Armstead threw up another one of those sneaky-good Armstead stat lines: nine rebounds, three assists, three steals, two turnovers.
Also, there's this: When the burly Alabama native scores 11 points or more, the Shockers are 12-1.
"I mean, I could see that being a true number right there," guard Ron Baker said. "Because when he's aggressive and Carl is getting his double-double, we're a pretty tough team."
When Armstead commits two turnovers or less, they're even tougher: 18 wins, two losses.
"It's just a matter of (saying), ‘Don't try to thread the needle,'" offered Armstead, who went into Saturday's action averaging 9.7 points and four assists this season, his first since transferring from Oregon. "You can't thread the needle every time. Sometimes, you've got to pull it back and make the smart decision and don't force it and just take what the defensive gives you a lot of times."
A lot of times, Armstead's head coach likes to get all up in his grill, giving him an earful of grief. After the 6-foot ball-handler picked up a technical foul against Southern Mississippi on Dec. 22 — his second in three contests — Gregg Marshall sat him down for a little private chat, to try and re-establish the ground rules.
Being the coach-on-the-floor for the very blunt (and very, ahem, demonstrative) Marshall is hardly a picnic, even when times are good — but the Shockers guard said he actually understood the lecture, appreciated the boundaries.
"It's tough," Armstead said his relationship with his sometimes tempestuous coach. "You know, you don't want a soft coach. Because if it's a soft coach, you can get away with murder. That's not helping me in the long run. So with him being tough on me, you know, that just carries over through to the team."
Tough, Armstead knows. Tough, Armstead gets. The guy spent last year as a redshirt, paying his own tuition, working on the side, as the Shockers didn't have a scholarship available.
"(It) helped develop patience," said Armstead, who'd set a single-season record for steals (89) as a junior with the Ducks. "I wanted my last year to be a part of something special."
To pass the time, he would play pickup games with Baker, another redshirt who had to wait for a scholarship, and talk about the winter of 2013, plotting out the havoc they were going to wreak together.
"That off-year," Baker allowed, "definitely helped."
More than anything, it helped Armstead get a feel for the other guys on the roster — which chains he could yank, and which ones to leave alone. When a reporter earlier in the week brought up the Shockers' sordid history in the Gateway City — Wichita has yet to win the MVC tourney since the event moved to a neutral site in 1991 — players on the dais deferred to a nugget of wisdom from their veteran point guard.
"Malcolm always tells us," Early said. "That pressure can burst pipes, but it can also make diamonds."
Welcome to the Shockers' locker room, where The Tao of Malcolm is the rule of law.
"He always tries to keep everybody level-headed," Williams noted.
With advice? With gags? What, is he funny?
"Most definitely, yeah," Williams replied.
Seriously funny? Dave Chapelle funny?
A grin.
"I ain't going to give him that much credit," Williams chuckled.
Illinois State coach Dan Muller, mind you, showed no such reservations.
"I thought Armstead had an unbelievable game," the first-year Redbirds boss observed. "They were taking turns getting offensive rebounds. They were successful at what they do well. They offensive-rebounded it."
When they're right, the Shockers aren't unlike Big 12 co-champion Kansas State — not always pretty, but more often than not, effective as all get-out. Marshall's bunch are the floor-burn champions of the Valley, a group that can grind with anybody.
But like the Wildcats, they're also prone to agonizingly long scoring droughts. That old bug struck again Saturday: Between the 7:56 mark and the 0:06 mark of the first half, Wichita went without a bucket. In the meantime, the Redbirds went on a 16-0 run, clawing back to a tie the contest at 22-22 with 1:32 left in the period.
It was rendered academic in the end, though, because of two more K-State parallels: One, Wichita doesn't go away easy, regardless of the score. Two, the Shockers are crazy, crazy deep. Even without Early at full-strength — "I'm not a doctor, but what I heard was gastroenteritis," Marshall quipped afterward — the Shockers got eight points off the bench from Fred Van Vleet and another seven from Baker, wearing the ‘Birds down to a nub over the final 11 minutes and change.
Creighton (26-7) tries to kill you quickly, with long-range attacks firing left and right. Wichita prefers the slow route, like water torture: Drip, drip, drip, until you finally crack.
"They're certainly not perfect, but by and large, they share the ball, they defend it as a team very, very well," Marshall said of his men. "This one was one that we knew that (the Redbirds) were jacked up. We'd heard and read that this is what they wanted, and so we were going to make sure that they got everything that we could bring to the table."
Which brings us to the final, to Jays-Shockers, Round 3, the rubber match to end all rubber matches. The Valley's two best teams, the loop's two best programs, locking horns for what might be — if the Creighton-to-Big East rumors prove true — the last time.
"We're going to try to cut down nets," Marshall said. "They're going to try to cut down nets, maybe an exit. So I'd rather them be a little sad leaving than all jacked up leaving. It's going to make for great drama, great TV."
Especially in the backcourt. Armstead posted 15 points, six boards and five assists vs. the Jays in Wichita back on Jan. 19, and the Shockers escaped. Those numbers dipped to 6, 1 and 5 in the winner-take-all rematch at Omaha last weekend, and Creighton rolled. Pressure can make diamonds, all right, but it can also ruin a perfectly good March.
You can follow Sean Keeler on Twitter @seankeeler or email him at seanmkeeler@gmail.com
