Is Wichita State success such a Shocker? In a word, no

Greece over the U.S.?

A team full of players you had never heard of -- and might never hear of again -- dominated a group of the best athletic-apparel movers from our country this past summer at the FIBA World Championship. It was a stunning development to everybody except those who know basketball, and it was the exact same principle at work that allows schools like Wichita State to compete with schools like Connecticut, Duke and Kansas.

Allow me to explain.

Because of the revolving-door nature of college hoops, it's difficult for schools that recruit elite, NBA-caliber talent to build toward anything great. Hasheem Thabeet is a freshman at UConn, but he probably won't be a sophomore. Josh McRoberts is a sophomore at Duke, but he probably won't be a junior. Over at Kansas, Bill Self has a bunch of talented freshmen and sophomores, and in a perfect world he'd have the next three seasons to mold them into a Final Four team. But the reality is that if Self wants to win a title with that roster he'd be wise to do it this season, because Brandon Rush and any number of his teammates could become NBA rookies within the next year.

Meanwhile, at Wichita State the atmosphere is much different, and that's because when Turgeon signs a player it's understood he's probably getting that player for four years. Consequently, there is no pressure to rush things, so values and fundamentals are instilled and the recruit typically learns from upperclassmen while he practices, gets stronger and waits for his turn in the rotation. Then, when it comes, that recruit is surrounded by two other guys with similar career paths, plus a couple of transfers who've also been in the program for at least a year.

When they're all on the court together, what you get is what I saw at that Saturday morning practice, i.e., five intelligent, well-prepared veterans capable of doing to the so-called big boys what Greece did to the United States.

"We always talk about team defense and team offense," Turgeon said. "That's kind of what gives us a chance against the taller, faster, more athletic teams."

That's the on-the-court result.

The off-the-court result is equally significant.

Because Wichita State players stay in the program for four, sometimes five, years, the community is afforded the opportunity to become attached. Fans watch boys become men, and they know if they see a freshman in 2006 they'll probably also see him 2010, meaning success doesn't come with the fear of the other sneaker always just a triple-double away from dropping. So nobody worries about a big year leading to mass exodus like what happened at North Carolina two seasons ago, because graduation is the only definite roster wrecker.

So the Shockers return four starters.

So the school sold all 10,478 season tickets.

So WSU can afford to charter all but one road trip.

So a lack of stars doesn't mean this isn't a big-time program.

That, as they say, is the gist of it. And the sooner the nation takes note, the sooner the nation will cease being surprised in March by a team like Wichita State that was built on a solid foundation, a team that is less an overnight success story than something years in the making.