The one-two scoring punch of Craig Porter Jr. and Ricky Council IV helped Wichita State knock out visiting East Carolina, 70-62, Saturday afternoon at Charles Koch Arena in the regular season finale for both schools.
Wichita State (15-12, 6-9 American) locked up the No. 7 seed in next week's Air Force Reserve American Athletic Conference Championship and will meet either Tulsa or South Florida – the No. 10 seed – in Thursday's first round (2 p.m. CT, ESPNU).
Tulsa currently holds the 10-seed, but USF can steal it with a win at Temple and a Tulsa loss to UCF. Both of those games take place Sunday afternoon.
Council finished with a game-high 20 points on 8-of-15 shooting and grabbed seven rebounds. Porter logged his first double-double with 15 points and a career-high 10 rebounds to go with four assists and a pair of blocks.
Porter and Council teamed up for 25 of the last 30 Shocker points, beginning with Council's go-ahead layup with 14:00 to play.
WSU clung to a 56-55 lead near the 5:00-mark, but Porter and Council drove for dunks on back-to-back possessions to key a 10-0 Shocker run that effectively iced the game.
Tyson Etienne contributed 12 points on 3-8 of three-point shooting and leaped both Jason Perez and Terrel Benton for fourth-place on WSU's career triples list. He has 198 now.
Morris Udeze was 6-of-9 from the field and finished with 12 points.
Tristen Newton supplied 16 points, 11 rebounds and six assists for ECU (15-14, 6-11), which will be the No. 9 seed in next week's tournament, opposite No. 8 Cincinnati.
WSU improved to 6-0 all-time against ECU. Due to a mixture of COVID-19 and unbalanced scheduling, this was the first meeting between the schools in more than 26 months.
The Shockers also logged win No. 750 all-time at the Roundhouse, posting a 750-230 record in 66 seasons.
