McNeese State coach Will Wade orchestrates major turnaround in first season

If coaching basketball doesn’t work out, McNeese State coach Will Wade and assistant Brandon Chambers might have a future in the prognostication business.

Wade promised a quick turnaround in his first season at the Southland Conference school and delivered. The 12th-seeded Cowboys, who face No. 5 Gonzaga on Thursday in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, won a school record 30 games and will play in March Madness for the first time since 2002.

“I can’t wait to start the largest turnaround in college basketball next season,” Wade said at his introductory press conference last March. “We’re going to go from 23 losses to 23-plus wins. Remember I said that.”

The Cowboys improved from 11-23 last season to 30-3, the program’s first winning season since 2012. They join James Madison and No. 1 seeds UConn and Houston as Division I’s only 30-win teams.

After handling Nicholls 92-76 in the Southland Conference championship game, Cowboys assistant coach Brandon Chambers began working on potential first-round matchups and quickly zeroed in on Gonzaga.

“He’s like a mini bracketologist,” Wade said shortly after the brackets were revealed Sunday, “He has all these brackets and stuff up on his (wall). He texted us in our group chat, ‘My final answer is we’re going to be the 12 seed, playing the 5 seed Gonzaga in Salt Lake City.’ He put that in our staff group chat.

“I looked back at him afterwards and it’s, ‘I’ve already watched four of their games, we’re good. I’ve got this, this and this’ and he said ‘I’ll have the how to score on your computer in 20 minutes.’ He had started preparing for them. I have to give him credit for that.”

The Cowboys bring an 11-game winning streak into Thursday’s game. They reached a program-record high No. 29 in the NET rankings in early December and are currently No. 56.

McNeese State leads the country in scoring margin (18.9) and ranks third in field-goal percentage defense (38.5) and steals (10.4 per game). The Cowboys’ three losses were to Western Carolina by two points, Louisiana Tech by nine and Southeastern Louisiana by three.

They have wins against Michigan (87-76), UAB (81-60) and VCU (76-65). UAB won the AAC Tournament and is a 12 seed facing No. 5 San Diego State in Spokane on Friday. VCU, which lost in the Atlantic 10 tournament championship.

McNeese State’s first priority is slowing down Gonzaga’s transition game.

“They play at one of the fastest paces in the country,” Wade said. GU coach Mark Few’s teams “always look like they’re shot out of a rocket when they go into transition offense.”

Grad student Shahada Wells averages a team-high 17.8 points, hits 40.3% on 3-pointers and 78.6% at the free throw line on a team-leading 159 attempts. The 6-foot, 185-pound guard saw limited time at TCU last season, including five scoreless minutes in an 84-81 loss to Gonzaga in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.

“It’s a revenge tour,” Wells said. “Lost to them last year at TCU, get another chance to go in and beat them this time.”

Junior Christian Shumate, a 6-6, 213-pound forward, averages 11.9 points and a team-best 9.5 rebounds. Guards Javohn Garcia and DJ Richards Jr. each contribute 11.4 points and Richards has hit 80 3-pointers at a 45.2% clip. Post Antavion Collum chips in 8.8 points and 4.6 boards.

“It’s a big stage,” Shumate said. “It’ll be good to be able to be there and show what we can do as a team and show how good of a team we are. And just put everybody on notice we’re a real force to be reckoned with no matter who we’re playing.”

Wade was fired as LSU’s head coach just before the 2022 NCAA Tournament after the school received a notice of allegations from the NCAA, stemming from a federal investigation into college basketball in 2017. He was handed a two-year show-cause order and a 10-game suspension – served at the outset of this season – for three Level I violations, the Independent Accountability Resolution Process (IARP) ruled in June.

The IARP penalty replaced a one-year show cause penalty and five-game suspension imposed by McNeese State upon hiring Wade.

Despite recruiting restrictions and missing the first 10 games, Wade and his staff put together a talented roster that hit the ground running with an 11-point win over eventual 22-win VCU in the season opener with Chambers as acting head coach.

“When I talked to Heath (Schroyer, athletic director) initially about the job, I’m like, ‘I think we can turn this into Murray State.’ He was like, ‘Murray State? How about Gonzaga!’ ” said Wade, hitting a table with his hand for emphasis. “I’m like, ‘OK, OK, OK.’

“It’s ironic. You can always find storylines based on the pairings in the NCAA Tournament, and I think that’s certainly a unique storyline. That’s a team and a program a lot of people at our level aspire to be. We’ll get to check our temperature and see how close we are, how far away we are.”