The RoundHouse | 6/13/2018 4:01:00 PM

By Paul Suellentrop
 
Wichita State's first school year in the American Athletic Conference is complete. We can retire the comparisons of small Midwestern cities with big metropolitan areas, weather and travel. We know the look of most of the new arenas, ballparks and uniforms. 
 
When the 2018-19 school year starts, one men's Shocker and one women's Shocker will have played in a Missouri Valley Conference basketball game. For volleyball, it's five with MVC experience. Baseball's roster won't contain more than 11 and the draft could take two.
 
College moves fast. Now Wichita State can gauge its pace compared to its new rivals.
 
The plus of the American showed up most prominently when the NCAA selected its fields.
 
The Shockers earned a No. 4 seed in the men's basketball tournament, its best seed since the 2014 team grabbed a No. 1. The softball and women's tennis teams earned at-large spots, a first for tennis. Volleyball hosted NCAA play for the first time. Baseball didn't make an NCAA regional, but it had a chance late in the season because it played in the nation's fourth-ranked conference (by RPI).
 
"Knowing where we're going, knowing the competition level (will help)," baseball coach Todd Butler said. "The pitching was really good. The conference was really good."
 
The transition, as expected, presented plenty of obstacles. 
 
Wichita State won one conference title – volleyball. It tied for second in men's basketball and tied for third in softball. Track and field, a dominant men's and women's force in the MVC, finished third on the men's side in indoor and outdoor track. Women's tennis earned the third seed in the conference tournament and lost in the semifinals.
 
A year ago, Wichita State celebrated its fifth straight MVC All-Sports Trophy, highlighted by seven titles won or shared. This year, schools such as Houston (six titles), Central Florida (three titles, three runner-ups) and South Florida (two titles, four runner-ups) give Wichita State something to shoot for.
 
Along the way, coaches and administrators took a good look at their competition. 
 
"I did think there were times last year when the teams in our league were just bigger and more physically imposing than us," basketball coach Gregg Marshall said. "That's to be expected. We were recruiting Missouri Valley athletes."
 
Marshall recruited to improve his size and strength. Butler wants more left-handed pitchers. 
Every coach started the off-season with an idea of new needs and new geographic areas for recruiting.
 
"That combination of skill-set and athleticism is really important," women's basketball coach Keitha Adams said. "It's a very, very good conference. You've got some highly skilled players and then you've got some really athletic players in this conference."
 
Track and field coaches dealt with a larger number of opponents in the conference meet, which means deeper fields in events and more of a premium on high-level point-scorers. Houston's men's team swept the indoor and outdoor conference titles on its way to a third-place finish in the NCAA Outdoor Championships. 
 
"We've run into a conference where there's a team that's at the highest point they've ever been," track and field assistant director John Wise said. "Do we recruit different? Do we need to schedule different? Are the athletes that we have that we recruited to the Missouri Valley the kind of athletes that we'll need in the American Athletic Conference? Generally, the answer has been yes. It's not been that dramatic of a difference, but we'll tweak it as we go."
 
Most American schools are all-in on football, which means their facilities and budgets are directed at competing with SEC, ACC and Big 12 schools as much as possible. While much of those resources go to football, other sports benefit from the wow factor and the space devoted to training, strength and conditioning. 
 
Some of Wichita State's space crunch will be helped by the $13-million Student-Athlete Success Center, to be built adjacent to Koch Arena. That building will house an expanded study hall, academic offices, administrative offices and a track and field weight room. A $3-million addition to Eck Stadium for strength and conditioning and a new clubhouse will also help.
 
This summer, Wilkins Stadium's five-foot tall wooden fence will be replaced by a padded wall, six-feet high, and the center-field dimensions pushed back 10 feet to 220 to comply with NCAA rules. Cessna Stadium's track will be resurfaced ahead of hosting next spring's American outdoor meet.
 
Facilities that uniformly ranked at the top or near the top of the MVC are now competing in a pricier neighborhood, both in areas fans see and behind-the-scenes spaces.
 
"We've got work to do; but that's OK," senior associate athletic director Becky Endicott said. "It's OK that we have new challenges. In the Valley . . . our venues were some of the nicest. But there's a lot going on in the American. We're going to have to look at each one of our facilities and our venues." 
 
Wichita State's highlights from 2017-18:
 
Wichita State officially joined the American in July, leaving the MVC after 72 years. It is a landmark change for the athletic department and part of changes throughout the university meant to move the school into a new peer group.
 
Wichita State's volleyball team,led by six seniors, started the transition to the new conference with a dominant run to the American title. The Shockers went 20-0, swept 16 of those matches and endured only one five-setter. 
 
Then things got better when the NCAA rewarded them with a No. 16 national seed and their first regional hosting honor. Wichita State defeated Radford 3-0 in front of 7,257 fans. Missouri knocked off the Shockers 3-1 in the round of 32 with the attendance of 7,258 fans setting a record again.
 
"I wasn't going to let any one match define anything this year, and that includes the last one," Wichita State coach Chris Lamb said. "We had an historic season. The consistency that this team displayed is unlike anything I've ever been a part of."
 
Lamb was named national Coach of the Year by Volleyball Magazine. Middle blocker Abbie Lehman earned American Player of the Year honors and Emily Hiebert was named American Setter of the Year.
 
Men's basketball fueled the move to the American and what was judged a mutually beneficial relationship paid off big. The Shockers peaked at No. 3 in the national polls and stayed in the rankings all season. 
 
They helped the American put three teams in the NCAA Tournament and Cincinnati earned a No. 2 seed. The American helped the Shockers earn a No. 4 seed. While the American enjoyed Selection Sunday, none of the teams escaped the first weekend. Losses by Wichita State (Marshall), Houston (Michigan) and Cincinnati (Nevada) ruined much of the March buzz, the conference showed it can produce strong NCAA seeds, a must if it wants to demand a spot on the national scene.

The new (or old) rivalries with opponents such as Cincinnati, Houston, Temple and Tulsa energized fans. They traveled in big numbers to the conference tournament to Orlando, a site that received middling reviews for its atmosphere and location far from basketball-centric schools. The tournament moves to Memphis next year and Fort Worth from 2020-22, great news for traveling Shocker fans.
 
Wichita State's women's basketball also entered the new conference with an experienced roster – eight seniors. The Shockers went 9-7 in the American to finish tied for fifth after the preseason voting ranked them No. 10. They defeated then-No. 23 South Florida, their third victory over a ranked opponent in program history.
 
Women's basketball in the American is focused on Connecticut. The Huskies will play in Wichita next season for the first time.
 
NCAA basketball made its return to Wichita with first- and second-round games at Intrust Bank Arena. Wichita State hosted, as it will in 2021. The men's tournament, once a regular event at Wichita State, returned to the city for the first time since 1994.
 
Senior Taryn Torgerson won medalist honors at the American women's golf championship in a playoff. She shot a conference-record 64 in the final round to finish at 5-under-par 211. 
 
The women's tennis team defeated Syracuse 4-1 in the first round of the NCAAs before losing 4-2 to host Mississippi. The Shockers finished No. 32 in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association rankings after a season in which they defeated four teams ranked in the top 50 at the time of the match.
 
Sophomore Fatima Bizhukova won two matches against opponents ranked in the top five by the ITA and became the fifth Shocker to play in the NCAA Individual Championship.
 
Wichita State softball stamped its season with two NCAA wins over Oklahoma State and advanced to the regional final round for the first time before losing to host Arkansas. The Shockers finished the regular season No. 35 in the RPI and earned an at-large bid for the second time in program history.
 
Senior third baseman Mackenzie Wright earned American Player of the Year honors.
 
Shocker baseball went 35-21-1 to record its best winning percentage since 2010.
 
Philadelphia drafted third baseman Alec Bohm third, making the highest drafted American player in the conference's five-season history. Bohm hit 16 home runs, most by a Shocker since 2004, and earned second-team All-American honors from Baseball America.
 
Senior Hunter Veith finished second in the heptathlon at the NCAA Indoor Championship with 6,090 points. He earned his fourth NCAA All-American honor, most by any male Shocker track athlete. He entered the NCAA decathlon with the nation's second-highest score (8,046), but back pain forced him to withdraw during the first day. 
 
Junior Aaron True won the American javelin throw and finished eighth in the NCAA Outdoor Championship, earning his first All-American honor.
 
Paul Suellentrop covers Wichita State Athletics and the American Athletic Conference for university Strategic Communications. Contact him at paul.suellentrop@wichita.edu.