WKU Basketball: After 11 Frustrating Years, the Tops are Back in the Dance Where They Belong
Nearly crippling our will to believe, over a decade of close calls and frustration has finally lifted a program record 11 year drought with a long awaited NCAA Tournament appearance.
As the seconds ticked down in Huntsville and the realization that the nightmare of the Hilltoppers’ NCAA Tournament drought was finally about to come to a close, I got an emotion that I hadn’t experienced for a while while watching the Hilltopper Basketball program: Euphoria. This is a feeling that had eluded the fan base’s collective consciousness over 11 years of underperformance, frustration, near misses, big wins, and occasional apathy, finally lifting as the 3 seeded Hilltoppers finally got over the hump. The dread of waiting for the other shoe to drop finally disappeared as the 2023-24 Western Kentucky Hilltoppers finally slayed the proverbial beast of the Conference USA Tournament and will be dancing the for the first time in 11 years.
Those 11 years of Hilltopper basketball have been a mix of close calls and missed glory as our proud fanbase had to endure the longest NCAA drought in WKU Basketball history1. Over the course of those 11 years WKU broke the 20 win barrier seven times and would annually post an update of this graphic:
The pride of seeing our program mentioned side by side with the bluest of the blue bloods of the sport always gives fans an immense pride in our little corner of college basketball history. But as each year of the NCAA drought grew, bittersweet feelings would enter the mind when seeing this graphic. “Are we ever going to get over the hump and get back into the Big Dance?” Fans were tired of being trapped in good but not great territory as the luck that had sometimes accompanied mid major programs in one bid leagues disappeared over the last decade plus.
When the 16th seeded Ray Harper-led Hilltoppers almost upset #1 Seed Kansas in 2013, Western Kentucky Basketball was arguably at its modern apex when it came to making the NCAA Tournament. From 2001 to 2013, the Hilltoppers made the tournament seven times in 12 seasons (58.33% of the time). Despite WKU’s precarious position of being in a one bid league (the Sun Belt), Hilltopper fans had come to not only expect a trip to the Big Dance but had expectations of making noise when they got there as they had in 2009, 2008, 1995 and 1993 within recent memory. Even 2012 produced a win, although it was in a First Four game.
As the graphic above shows, Hilltopper Basketball has been consistently great for a long time. When E.A. Diddle arrived on campus in 1922, success followed and never left for more than a handful of years at a time. Once the NCAA Tournament had established itself as the premiere basketball tournament in the county, WKU Basketball made itself a tournament mainstay that most other smaller schools could only wish to emulate. Through different eras, coaches and conferences (OVC and Sun Belt) WKU made the tournament at a pace of 3.8 times per decade:
1960s-4 appearances
1970s-4 appearances
1980s-3 appearances
1990s-3 appearances
2000s-5 appearances
2010s-2 appearances
2020s-0 appearances (4 years)2
As you can tell, the Hilltoppers’ March excellence transcended generations across coaches, players and eras of college basketball. When WKU showed up to conference tournament in March, it was an expectation that WKU would probably find a way to win. In the 1990s and 2000s, those eight Hilltopper tournament squads annually finished atop the Sun Belt standings with some high level talent and some at-large quality resumes. They won the Sun Belt Tournament 7-of-8 times in those NCAA years and only once did they have to leave their fate to the NCAA Tournament Committee to earn an at large bid (1993-94)3.
After Ray Harper’s back-to-back bids in 2012 and 2013, the thought was the program was in great shape moving forward, and the pace of success would continue as it had for the preceding 80+ years. Unfortunately for our proud program, things didn’t work out as planned. When the Hilltoppers moved from the Sun Belt to Conference USA for the 2014-15 season, they unknowingly made their established path to the NCAA tournament harder.
Those magic Harper runs masked regular season struggles that the program could overcome in the consistently mediocre Sun Belt Conference. As the Wizard of Hot Springs won 4 games in 4 days he did so as a 7 seed and a 6 seed beating teams that were Seeded 5th (North Texas) and 4th (FIU) in the Tournament Championships. The Sun Belt would produce a couple of worthy adversaries each season but on the whole, the league left the program a lot of margin for error when it came to the do or die conference tournament paths that WKU had to conquer in order to make the NCAA Tournament. If we’re being real here, WKU has largely taken advantage of situations within conference tournaments and often one with lower seeds. Very rarely has WKU earned a one seed and won with it.
Conference USA from 2014-2023 was arguably one of the toughest one bid leagues in the country. While it rarely had teams that had the resume necessary for the NCAA bubble let alone a “lock” for an at-large bid, the Conference USA Tournament regularly produced teams that made it out of the opening round of the NCAA Tournament (Middle Tennessee, UAB, Marshall, North Texas, and FAU all did it since 2014). Instead of a few worthy adversaries each season, WKU had to overcome at least half of the conference with upperclassmen laden, well coached teams every season that lowered everyone’s margin for error. Gone were the Ray Harper-esque runs where mid seeds could find themselves cutting down the nets. Top four seeds won the tournament each year of WKU’s first nine years in the league.
Ray Harper couldn’t replicate his legendary start despite having all conference level stars TJ Price and George Fant for two more years. He would finish his last season in the Sun Belt in second place, losing to Louisiana-Lafayette by a point in the conference semifinals. That year, the SBC used a “double bye” system for the top two seeds, who automatically qualified for the semifinals. From there, he would struggle to maintain the talent level on the roster while adjusting to the harder CUSA slate. He led the Hilltoppers to 5th and 8th places finishes and never made it out of the CUSA semifinals in Birmingham. Those declining returns combined with an off the court scandal involving three of his players led Todd Stewart to allow Ray Harper’s contract to expire three years into WKU’s tournament drought.
Stewart would make a splashy hire in former Mississippi State coach Rick Stansbury, who in many ways was the antithesis of Ray Harper. Stansbury’s recruiting prowess along with his folksy demeanor brought a much needed buzz back to the program. He promised to not only raise the talent level on the Hill but also pledged to awaken the fan base and start selling out Diddle Arena again. Having to pick up the pieces of a depleted roster in the wake of the under wraps scandal, Stansbury struggled in his first year, going just 15-17 (9-9 in CUSA) and bowing out early in the Conference Tournament.
It was off the court that Stansbury excelled, regularly winning recruiting battles against Power Conference foes garnering 4 and 5 star standouts such as Mitchell Robinson and Josh Anderson along with Mister Kentucky Basketball and high three star Taveion Hollingworth. Those recruiting wins would be a blessing and a curse for Stansbury as the hype for the 2017-18 season was palpable. But drama followed as the McDonald’s All-American Mitchell Robinson never saw the court for the Hilltoppers after a very public “will he won’t he” played out with Robinson skipping his one eligible year of college to train for the NBA Draft.
In the summer and early fall, they were looking like a team that could go ten deep, but when Mitchell Robinson (who was drafted by the New York Knicks the next NBA Draft and still plays for them to this day) left, several other players followed him out the door. In a theme that would haunt Stansbury throughout his tenure, several other players wouldn’t make it to campus that year, and the 2017-18 Hilltoppers only had seven scholarship players available to start the season.
Despite it all, Stansbury delivered the best regular season in recent memory. He (and seniors Justin Johnson, Darius Thompson, and Dwight Coleby) led the Hilltoppers to memorable wins over Purdue and SMU despite starting off a rocky 7–5. WKU would then reel off 15 wins in 17 games and set themselves up for a potential NCAA tournament at-large bid. WKU would lose their final two of that regular season as their at-large hopes died, but they rallied to make the finals of the Conference USA Tournament.
From 2018 to 2023 Conference USA would play the tournament in the Dallas Cowboys football practice facility (The Star) away from WKU’s loyal traveling fan base with a weird curtain dividing two courts and small, non-permanent stands erected on one sideline. This was an awkward set up that definitely killed the title game atmosphere and favored the Texas schools due to proximity.
While not as bad as some people would claim, the Hilltoppers’ Frisco curse started during the 2018 C-USA (This was pre removal of the dash in “CUSA”, a literal press release a couple of offseasons ago) Conference Championship game against Marshall. They went back and forth with the Herd but fell behind by twelve in the second half before rallying and cutting it to one in a dramatic, blitzkrieg level comeback. A last-second shot by Lamonte Bearden came too much English short of going in as WKU’s streak of NCAA-less seasons stretched to five seasons.
WKU’s resume did qualify them for their first NIT bid in a decade which they took full advantage of, beating Power Conference opponents Boston College, USC and Oklahoma State to get them to the NIT Final Four at Madison Square Garden, where they led Utah in the last minute before losing a heartbreaker. WKU finally had a season that reflected their aspirations as a top mid-major and the future once again looked bright.
Stansbury would build off that season by adding 5-star Center Charles Bassey to the fold and unlike Robinson, got him to stick with his commitment. Expectations were sky-high in 2018–19 but the team once again struggled to meet expectations. They dropped several losses to bad teams (Indiana State, Troy, Missouri State, and FIU), canceling out big wins over West Virginia, Arkansas, Wisconsin, and St. Mary’s and finishing the regular season 18–13. WKU once again rallied to make the Conference USA Tournament final but lost to a senior-laden Old Dominion team in the second half to extend the NCAA-less streak to six seasons and finish a very disappointing 20–14 overall leaving a bad taste in several fans mouths.
Three years into the Stansbury tenure and fan angst started to fester as Stansbury’s flaws reappeared each season. A familiar cycle would take place each season.
-Big recruiting wins
-Enormous preseason hype
-Roster issues (eligibility, transfers and grades)
-A mixed bag of huge non conference wins and excruciating losses killing at-large possibilities
-A top 4 conference finish that would give WKU a path back to the conference title game
-One team that would stand between WKU and glory (Marshall, ODU, North Texas (x2))
-An excruciating conference title game loss that was a mix of bad luck and bad coaching decisions.
That cycle would continue in 2019-2020 as Bassey unexpectedly returned for his sophomore year4. The mixed bag of non-conference play continued until a Bassey knee injury at home against Arkansas threw a giant wrench into the Hilltoppers plans. They would rally to beat the Razorbacks in the game that Bassey went down, but Stansbury would be forced to adjust his style on the fly without a true center to lean upon for conference play. A veteran team would rally with Taveion Hollingworth, who elevated his game down that stretch run to put WKU on the precipice of their first regular season title since 2009.
All that stood in the Hilltoppers way was a matchup against conference co-leader North Texas in Denton. The Hilltoppers led by 7 with 5 minutes to play. The Mean Green wouldn’t go away though as a combination of bad offensive possessions by WKU and an attacking offense helped UNT tie it back up at 63. Taveion Hollingsworth drew a foul with 5.6 seconds remaining but inexplicably missed both free throws and UNT couldn’t get a shot off at the buzzer and the game headed to overtime tied at 63. WKU would battle in overtime before falling 72-78 as the Hollingsworth missed free throws loomed large on the outcome.
COVID caused the cancellation of the C-USA tournament before the 2nd seeded Hilltoppers would ever see the floor, leaving the loss at North Texas as the defacto third title loss in three years, extending the title drought to seven years. Although it probably wouldn’t sit great with WKU fans historically, North Texas was considered C-USA’s NCAA Tournament representative since no tournament was played. As the one seed, they were the Conference USA Champions that year.
Stansbury would have one last top level team the following season as Bassey, Hollingworth, and Josh Anderson all returned and the roster drama that had plagued the program finally disappeared (for the most part). The wacky covid year included near empty stadiums, conference doubleheaders (with random cancellations) and regular player absences. This season included more high level wins like Memphis and Alabama, but a late season loss to Old Dominion killed WKU’s at-large aspirations as the CUSA East Champions headed to Frisco with the best record in the league. This was the second time WKU simply needed to win to open up a door to make it in spite of a loss in the CUSA Tournament but didn’t execute late in the season.
The Hilltoppers would once again return to the Championship Game, but after the past three misses, the 2021 CUSA Tournament Title Game had an air of doubt cast upon it as Hilltopper fans were waiting for the next letdown. This was the crucial tipping point. WKU fans had finally started to give up hope. Even though WKU was the slight favorite, the situation just stank of the possibility of another letdown, and boy did it meet those expectations.
The team did itself no favors falling behind North Texas 17-0 in the opening five minutes of the game. From there, the Hilltoppers played near flawless ball outscoring North Texas 48-24 over the next 32 minutes to hold a seven point lead with 2:56 remaining. Similar to the previous year’s loss to the Mean Green, WKU struggled with late game offense and missed free throws to allow North Texas to force overtime tied at 48. The teams would stay deadlocked until the final minute of overtime but Javion Hamlet made a floater for UNT, while Taveion Hollingsworth would get his tying shot blocked and WKU once again found itself on the short end of a do or die game for the NCAA Tournament.
After making it to the finals in four straight years without that elusive NCAA Tournament to show for it, fans continued to sour on Stansbury. However, many fans were still completely loyal to him, and understandably so. Rick had plenty of measurables, winning big time games, especially early in the season. His teams also generally performed well in the Conference USA Tournament, and they certainly did have some awful luck in championship games. If Lamonte Bearden’s shot or Josh Anderson’s putback went in against Marshall, the entire direction of the program would have changed back to a normal WKU cycle of success. If WKU hadn’t gone cold against Old Dominion. If WKU hadn’t missed a few free throws. If, if, if. But it’s worth mentioning that plenty of people were still on board with Rick Stansbury. But huge portions of the WKU fan base changed their tune after the meltdown against UNT.
What was once seen as a charming folksy demeanor grew stale as sayings such as “there’s a fine line between winning and losing” only chafed the fan base more and more anytime he used excuses to overcome his inability to get over the hump.
The last two years of his tenure entered the declining returns phase as the core from 2017-21 aged out of the program. Recruiting started to take a slight downturn as the 4 stars became more and more sparse in each class. The ones that did land weren’t nearly as good as the likes of Josh Anderson and Charles Bassey. Stansbury took roster chances on several talented players that didn’t work out (Zion Harmon and Keith Williams), leaving the 2021-22 team shorthanded having to bring Camron Justice back off of the street as the teams record declined to 19-13 (11-7) with a quarterfinal exit to Louisiana Tech. Frustratingly in that one, all WKU needed to do was not be terrible, because La Tech couldn’t hit anything. However, neither could the Hilltoppers.
One final hyped roster took the court in 2022-23 as WKU surprisingly kept star players Dayvion McKnight and Jamarion Sharp from getting poached by P5 programs. He bolstered that team with several high powered transfers, but after a 8-1 start the wheels fell off as the team went 9-15 down the stretch after failing to jell all while Stansbury faced health issues. When the Hilltoppers bowed out in the CUSA quarterfinals against eventual Final Four participant FAU, it was mercifully over for Stansbury. He finally had no real excuse this time. His team was terrible with and without him, and he had an immensely talented roster that just couldn’t get it done.
During his tenure he created a lot of buzz, raised the talent level to quality unseen since the 1960s, and generated some of the most memorable regular season wins of the past 30 years. But his in-game coaching flaws, roster drama, and inability to get over the hump and return the program to the NCAA tournament divided the fan base and led to his downfall. Despite having seven chances (tied for the second longest tenured WKU coach ever), he was the first coach in WKU history to not make the NCAA tournament5.
After Stansbury resigned on March 11th, WKU desperately searched for a new coach that could lead the proud program back to the promised land. Several names were bandied about, but Todd Stewart landed on Texas A&M-Corpus Christi head coach Steve Lutz, who had taken the Islanders to back-to-back NCAA Tournament bids for the first time in program history. In fact, he took over a program with five wins and zero NCAA Tournament history and immediately won a championship in his first year. The former Purdue assistant was the antithesis of Stansbury as he was a no nonsense X’s and O’s coach that wouldn’t wow on the recruiting trail but would make up for it on the practice court. After retaining just four Stansbury scholarship holdovers (Dontaie Allen, Khristian Lander, Tyrone Marshall and Fallou Diagne), he methodically built a roster with P5 (Brandon Newman, Rodney Howard) and JUCO transfers (Don McHenry, Enoch Kalambay) to forge an under the radar team featuring a lot of depth—even if vastly unheralded—compared to the preceding versions of the Hilltoppers.
While Stansbury limped to the end of his tenure, Conference realignment transformed CUSA as league stalwarts UAB, Marshall, FAU, Old Dominion, North Texas (along with several other basketball bottom feeders) all outmaneuvered WKU out of the league. The replacement programs (Liberty, New Mexico State, Jacksonville State, Sam Houston) all had different levels of rebuilding going on as they transitioned into the league, making CUSA much easier right when Lutz was taking over the program. Another new wrinkle that gave WKU fans hope was the conference tournament finally moving away from Frisco to nearby Huntsville, Alabama a mere three hours drive away from Bowling Green. It’s fair to say both changes proved crucial for this year’s Hilltoppers.
However, once on the court, the differences between Lutz and his predecessor were day and night. Lutz ran the fastest tempo in the country and played a rotation that was 11 deep. Instead of talking about running up-tempo, he actually played up-tempo, and (for the love of God) he played most of his players. Fans swooned over the changes that showed the page had been turned. At the end of the day, this year actually played out similarly to the late Harper and Stansbury era record wise.
Lutz was a victim of Stansbury’s non conference success leaving him with a non-conference schedule with zero Power conference programs. Unlike Stansbury, he took advantage of that weak schedule to start the season 12-3 on the year. As they neared conference play, though, injuries and road woes led to an uneven conference season. After a decent start to conference play, the Hilltoppers would lose 4 of their next 6 games falling to 3-4 in the league. A five game winning streak would follow and dreams of a regular season conference title began to form. They came crashing down to reality as a four game losing streak came seemingly out of nowhere to close out the regular season 19-11 (8-8 in Conference USA). WKU was 19-7 and a half game out of first place before dropping four in a row.
But the aforementioned diminished lineup of new teams in the league propelled the Hilltoppers to a third place finish behind Sam Houston State and Louisiana Tech despite the .500 league record. Somehow the Toppers fell backwards into sole possession of third place despite the 8-8 record in CUSA play. When Conference Tournament play started, the 3rd seeded Hilltoppers path back to the NCAA’s worked out immaculately as the top seeds were taken out by others. In addition, WKU had about as good a matchup draw as possible, giving WKU a path of New Mexico State (6 seed), Middle Tennessee (7 seed) and finally UTEP (5 seed) to return the Hilltoppers to glory. UTEP was the lone matchup issue, but after WKU blew out its two previous opponents, it was almost a foregone conclusion that as long as WKU showed in the finals against UTEP, they would win.
Lutz put his perfect conference tournament record on the line starting with New Mexico State, and the Hilltoppers locked in a statement performance, erasing all doubts from the previous four game losing streak to rout the Aggies (who played pretty well) by 20. The team was firing on all cylinders as they boat raced MTSU by 31 in a revenge match from two weeks earlier. Finally, a rubber match against defensively tough UTEP in the finals was all that stood in the way of the Tops, who had the very easiest draw in terms of realistic possibilities ever. WKU could have faced NMSU, two seed La Tech, and one seed or four seed Liberty, and instead face the easiest path possible to the finals, against the lowest seeded team realistically capable of making the finals.
The defensive intensity from the previous two games carried over into the championship game, but the hot shooting did not sustain as the Miners forced WKU to shoot just 18.8% from deep. A double digit lead evaporated under UTEP’s pressure defense, as the Hilltoppers would cling to just a four point halftime lead. A familiar feeling of dread began to take hold as the Miners would come out of the locker room blazing hot, taking a seven point lead five minutes into the second half. But Lutz and his team proved that they weren’t the Hilltoppers of the past decade. They lived inside on the Miners defense and wore them down as the game went on, taking a double digit lead into the final five minutes and cruising to a 78-71 win to finally end the Hilltoppers’ NCAA Tournament drought at 11 years. The curse was lifted and Hilltopper Nation could finally celebrate what was used to be commonplace again.
At the end of the day, the Hilltoppers will return to the NCAA tournament for the 24th time in their history. That’s more NCAA Tournament appearances than higher acclaimed programs such as Florida, Dayton, UNLV, Oregon, Florida State, Butler, Texas Tech, Vanderbilt and Auburn. Steve Lutz has finally broken the good but not good enough streak of the past decade and returned Western Kentucky to the promised land.
Now it is time to enjoy it! Whether you’re a diehard that has lived and died with this team for decades or you’re a casual fan (or an Alum) that follows the Hilltoppers from arms length, we can all embrace this long overdue moment of joy. The lost decade is finally over.
Moving forward, lets hope we can dream of deep tournament runs instead of just getting back. We may or may not have Lutz for long, but finally the recent generation of Hilltopper fans can hang their hat on the present instead of the past. Regardless of how WKU does against Marquette on Friday, we can all revel that our program’s name was called on Selection Sunday again, and we get to finally witness the continuation of the legacy of consistency that dates back to E.A. Diddle in the 1920s.
Since the NCAA Tournament overtook the NIT as the premier postseason tournament in the late 1950s/early 1960s
0 tournament appearances in 4 years before breaking through on Saturday
Darrin Horn’s 2004-05 squad is the only real NCAA snub of the last 30 years as they were the last team left out of the 05 Dance
Bassey probably would have been drafted, but he likely would not have been drafted in the first round
Since the NCAA tournament started in 1939