Raiders hope recent success continues on the road

Grant Benzinger shoots a fall away jumper as his 16 points led the Raiders to a 60-52 win over IUPUI at Nutter Center on Saturday, Dec. 30, 2017. WSU heads in 2018 with a 10-5 record. ALLISON RODRIGUEZ

Grant Benzinger shoots a fall away jumper as his 16 points led the Raiders to a 60-52 win over IUPUI at Nutter Center on Saturday, Dec. 30, 2017. WSU heads in 2018 with a 10-5 record. ALLISON RODRIGUEZ

Wright State has figured out the formula for winning at home, now the Raiders needs to find a way to win on the road if they hope to be a serious contender for the Horizon League title.

Scott Nagy’s team will get that chance in the next couple of weeks. Five of the next six games are on the road, beginning with a three-game trip that starts with a pair of games in Michigan this weekend.

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“For me it’s just one road game right now,” Nagy said referring to Friday night’s matchup with Detroit Mercy. “We know that championships are won on the road. Average teams can win at home, good teams win on the road.”

The Raiders own a share of the Horizon League lead after back-to-back wins at home last week. Wright State (10-5) has won three in a row and 10 of the last 12 games it’s played.

“We’re pretty good defensively,” Nagy said. “Offensively I feel like we’ve gone backwards a little bit. We haven’t shot the ball well and we really haven’t all year, but we’re a better shooting team than we’ve shot the ball.”

Wright State’s defense is the best in the league, allowing opponents only 64 points a game while creating 17 turnovers.

“Sometimes we take care of the ball, sometimes we don’t,” Nagy said. “When we do we’re hard to beat, when we don’t you have a chance to beat us.”

The Raiders face a struggling Detroit team Friday. The Titans (4-11, 0-2) have lost 9 straight games, and although they lead the league in scoring (83.9 points per game) they’re also tops at the other end of that statistical category, allowing 90 points per game to opponents.

“They’ve struggled during the streak but they’ve all been relatively tight games,” Nagy said. “Obviously they’re going to feel good going home. There’s going to be a lot of energy in the gym, and the game is on TV so we know that early we’re going to have to be good and we’ve gotten off to some pretty bad starts lately. I think it’s going to be important that the beginning of this game we’re ready to go.”

Wright State and Northern Kentucky not only share the Horizon League lead, the Raiders and the Norse are also travel partners which means NKU is also in Michigan this weekend.

The Norse is at Oakland on Friday night in a matchup of the top two teams in the preseason poll. They switch opponents with Wright State on Sunday.

The Raiders will then wrap up their three-game road trip at NKU next Thursday night.


FRIDAY’S GAME

Wright State at Detroit Mercy, 9 p.m., ESPNU, 106.5

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