Chanticleers return home from Hawaii eager to improve

After opening the season with two challenging games in Hawaii, the Coastal Carolina men’s basketball team faces a much different pair of contests while debuting at home this week.

Coach Cliff Ellis is looking at the games Wednesday night against Grace Bible College and Saturday against Piedmont International – both non-NCAA schools – as valuable opportunities to work with his team after feeling behind schedule in the preseason.

“Practice makes perfect. But if you don’t get to practice, then you can’t expect to [do] it in a game situation,” Ellis said. “We need more time with our team. We missed a lot of preseason.”

Coastal Carolina had four players out for the first couple weeks of the preseason after they were involved in a car accident near campus, and other injury concerns arose during the ensuing weeks.

The Chanticleers (0-2) then flew to Hawaii for a week to take part in the Outrigger Resorts Rainbow Classic, opening with a 73-56 loss to Nevada and a 74-63 loss to Hawaii.

The Chants totaled 37 turnovers combined in those two games and shot just 33.9 percent from the field.

“I think the big thing is the fact that we can’t turn the ball over as much as we turned it over. We lost the possession game,” Ellis said. “We played two very good basketball teams. No question, [they’re] at another level. It will be very similar to what we face in the Sun Belt [next year]. Just physical, longer teams, well coached. But the possession game, we lost it. We were in both basketball games. We had a chance in both basketball games. I think the score was not indicative of how close the games really were, but the bottom line [is] we lost the possession game.

“I think that it will make us better, but it also showed there are some things we need to work on.”

Junior point guard Shivaughn Wiggins continues to work through a hamstring injury that Ellis acknowledged affected his play in Hawaii, where he was 0-for-6 from the field while scoring two points off the bench in the first game and then scored 12 points with five turnovers in the second game.

“He was about 80 percent. He gives it everything that he’s got. He’s not healthy, but he’s getting there,” Ellis said. “And preseason has been a tough one for us because we had a five-and-a-half-week period and he missed three weeks. It’s not an excuse; it’s a fact. And we need him on the court. Hopefully each day we can get better and not have to use him as much in practice until he gets well because we’ve got a conference game coming up in less than two weeks and we’ve got a lot of big games ahead.”

This week, though, the Chants should have every opportunity to regroup and build some confidence.

Grace Bible College and Piedmont International are both members of the National Christian College Athletic Association’s Division II ranks.

These games, which fans groan about each year when the schedule is released, might well serve some value for this Coastal Carolina team as it looks to find its stride early in the season before legitimate upcoming non-conference tests.

Through two games, sophomore newcomer Jaylen Shaw leads the team in scoring at 14 points per game, senior forward Badou Diagne is averaging 12 points and 7 rebounds per contest and junior guard Elijah Wilson is at 10 points and 5.5 rebounds per game.

“We learned a lot from being in Hawaii, playing those two games against really good teams. We know what we have to work on. We know what we’re missing, so we’ll try to be better this game coming up,” Diagne said. “... It’s just two games, but we learned from it. Every game we learn from it. Every game if we’re missing something, we’ll work on it the next day and try to get better.”

NOTES: The Chants will receive their Big South championship rings for last season before the game Wednesday night.

This story was originally published November 17, 2015 at 9:45 PM with the headline "Chanticleers return home from Hawaii eager to improve."