Themus Fulks realized at an early age that the best approach to playing basketball was to win. And keep on winning.
It seems simple, but so many of the best things are. After learning to win as a youngster in North Carolina, Fulks has applied a relentless approach at each of his career stops. Now that he’s in Milwaukee, it’s a mindset that the Panthers are adopting – and it’s putting them on a heater. Figuratively, that is. After all, it’s winter in Wisconsin.
“Win, win, win, and keep on winning,” Fulks described the Panthers’ focus. “We want to be a great team, a special team, and win at a high level…we don’t want to get satisfied.” With final exams wrapping up, Fulks, AJ McKee, and head coach Bart Lundy spoke to the HoriZone Roundtable on Friday morning. It was a day which, for Fulks, began by brushing about five inches of fresh-fallen snow off of his car in order to get to practice. In speaking about how he views the game, Fulks had no trouble recalling something straightforward but brilliant that he learned back down south as a youngster.
“It was a quote one of my middle school coaches told me. He said some people say ‘you win some, you lose some’. But my coach, he told me ‘no, you win some, and then you win some more, and keep winning until they stop you from winning. Just keep winning’. And I said ‘wow, well why don’t I just try to do that then?'”
These days, Fulks and backcourt co-star McKee are helping to lead a Milwaukee team that’s getting comfortable with high expectations – and winning. Given their talent level and the program’s success the past two seasons under Lundy, there was broad consensus this fall in the media that the Black & Gold would challenge for a Horizon League title this winter. McKee’s arrival along with Fulks was reckoned a big factor in those predictions.
After all, at Queens (NC) University last year, McKee averaged 18.8 points and was named All-Atlantic Sun. He’s scored pretty steadily for the Panthers, too – McKee has hit double figures in all but one of MKE’s first 12 games, and he scored nine against St. Thomas. Even though he’s taken a bit to truly hit his stride as a shooter in Cream City, McKee is becoming increasingly comfortable with the Panthers. In addition, McKee has shown that he knows how to help out in a variety of ways – and that he will work his way into better situations in the games ahead.
“I’m not always just having to score and score, with so many pieces and different aspects around me,” McKee analyzed. “It’s to where I can do more. Focus in like, on the defensive end and be a leader on that side of the ball instead of just being a leader on one side of the ball.”
“AJ wasn’t shooting the ball great to start the season,” Lundy admitted. “But going back and forth with him in conversations and texts, we talked about ‘your confidence comes from your work, and he’s texting me ‘I’m going to stay in the gym, I know where my confidence comes from’. That’s a guy who’s been in it, who’s seen and played a lot of college basketball and he knows how to get himself out of it where a younger player might not.”
Things didn’t get off to a perfect start for the team overall, but the Panthers are now rounding into what they believe to be title-contending form. To reach this level, they’ve had to absorb some serious blows. First Northern Iowa and then Longwood knocked off the shorthanded Panthers in early November. More recently, hot-shooting Central Florida tripped Milwaukee, as did a five-point run by Southern Miss in the closing moments of a heartbreaking defeat. All four of those games were played on the road, and tough as they’ve been to abide, the Panthers are now building upon some better results close to home. Following an exciting couple of weeks which culminated in a show-stopping 100-81 victory over Akron this past Sunday, Milwaukee is looking forward to putting their frustrations in the rear-view mirror.
“Before the Cream City Classic we had had a three-game road trip where we went 1-2. To come home then and go 3-0 it just showed growth from everybody on the program,” McKee explained. “Win, win, win, win is the major thing. And everyone who’s here knows how to do that. Themus Fulks did that and went to the NCAA Tournament, and now we’ve got the stud in Jamichael Stillwell who’s doing big things. Erik Pratt is too, it’s just humongous, the things that have played into this state of winning.”
With the Panthers playing high-level basketball and starting to string big-time wins together, their goals are coming back into focus. The past three contests have all gone Milwaukee’s way in impressive fashion. Against Cleveland State, Green Bay, and the Zips since the beginning of December, the Panthers have won by a combined 17.3 points per game.
A big reason for those margins is that Fulks has joined McKee and Stillwell in reliably putting up big numbers. Supported by a core of proven returnees which includes Kentrell Pullian – who’s enjoying the best season of his career as the Panthers’ leading scorer – and Pratt, Milwaukee’s offense is becoming very dangerous. McKee brings the confidence and productivity of a guy who’s been the go-to option before, while Fulks is evolving into a rather complete lead guard.
Especially during the early part of this season, though, Stillwell has been as valuable as any Panther. He’s become one of the nation’s best rebounders and has racked up seven double-doubles in twelve games. Stillwell isn’t just the Horizon’s top rebounder – he’s leading the nation with 12.4 boards per contest. Maybe best of all, Stillwell has consistently generated a multitude of extra opportunities for Milwaukee to cash in on the offensive end.
“It’s been huge. You know for awhile there we weren’t making three’s and we were shooting a really poor free throw percentage. He was able to clean up a lot of that,” Lundy reflected about his breakout big man. “As a team we’ve been excellent on the offensive glass, which we’ve needed, especially early. We needed every one of those to make ourselves competitive. Now when you’re making some shots added to that it can become gravy, but early we were really living on the offensive glass.”
The Panthers currently rank 57th nationally in defensive rebounding rate, and thanks to Stillwell’s voracious efforts, they’re 2nd in all the land on the offensive boards. By snagging 40.1% of their own misses, Milwaukee can wear out their opponents by consistently generating multiple scoring chances, and as he piles up numbers, Stillwell’s confidence as a scorer is rising.
“Having that dynamic 4-man…I think that in mid-major basketball and really everywhere in college basketball, having that point guard and that dynamic 4-man really makes a huge difference. He (Stillwell) is a worker,” Lundy proclaimed. “What you see on the floor is what we see every day. In practice, he’s just kind of a warrior, and he’s really starting to expand his game from the perimeter and off the bounce. It’s been fun to watch him grow offensively and it’s really contagious to be around him and his toughness.”
Lots of teams brought in talent via the transfer portal this spring. Especially outside of the high majors, not many brought in guys who are such proven winners as Fulks and McKee are. Mckee’s history with Lundy goes back to their time together at Queens. Playing for Lundy in 2021-22, McKee helped the Royals to 30 wins and an appearance in the Division II Sweet Sixteen. A transfer from Louisiana-Lafayette who won a Sun Belt tournament title two years ago, Fulks knows what it’s like to earn a spot in the NCAA Tournament. He handed out 11 assists against 4-seed Tennessee in a tight First Round loss back then, and Fulks has only grown as an overall offensive player since making that run.
“The kind of thing I talked to Coach Lundy about before I came here was that I felt like I could score and I can pass. I’m a playmaker; not just a passer, not just a scorer, I’m a playmaker,” Fulks declared in describing his standout play this year. “Coach Lundy, ever since I got here, he’s made it known, we need you to pass the ball, and we need you to score the ball to. And him giving me the confidence to shoot the ball, you know I’m shooting the ball well right now…Coach Lundy and the coaching staff have given me the confidence to and trust me in telling me to shoot the ball and know that it will go in.”
“It’s really helped [having Fulks] to be able to break defenses down. To get guys shots. When we recruited him out of junior college, he was a good enough three point shooter that you couldn’t clog the lane on him, play off of him, you couldn’t go under ball screens. And that wasn’t his role at Louisiana, they didn’t want him to take those shots, and I think he lost his confidence. Through the summer and the fall, we tried to pump him up. We wanted to have your guy who gets paint touches also be good from outside because otherwise you’re way easier to guard. He’s done a great job.”
In emerging as the Horizon League’s best point guard, Fulks is showing how much there is to his game. Long regarded as a quality setup man, Fulks is creative, explosive, and highly entertaining driving the lane. As a Panther, Fulks is breaking out as a high-impact scorer. He’s not only leading the Horizon in assists per game; Fulks is a top-ten scorer in the conference and currently leads the Horizon with a 56.8% mark from the floor. He’s shown up in clutch moments, closing out victories by taking initiative and getting to the free throw line. He also came up big by hitting key shots in the final minutes against Wofford, St. Thomas, and Duquesne. As the Panthers put their finishing touches on a big day against Akron, Fulks scored 12 points between the nine-minute mark and the under four minute timeout. He canned jumpers, glided in for layups, and collapsed the Zips’ defense again and again. He also knew that it wasn’t a perfect effort, and quickly set about cleaning some things up.
“Themus had eight turnovers in that Akron game, which is not typical of him and we got together and talked about it. I thought I needed to go back and look at each one and find out if systematically we’re putting him in spots where we’re shrinking on the floor. And before I could even say it, he was like ‘I want to go back and watch every one of ’em and that’s a veteran player who’s been through and that hey, where there’s an area to improve let’s go do it,” Lundy recalled. “I’m really proud of how he’s led, how he’s put his arm around guys and helped this team along.”
Making their early-season success that much more impressive is that the Panthers have played the majority of their games thus far without two of the best players from last year’s team. In having to work for victories without Erik Pratt and Faizon Fields in the lineup, Milwaukee has built new bonds. Getting both Pratt and Fields back, then, should feel a bit like icing on the cake. Last winter, that pair combined to average 24.2 points after the new year in helping Milwaukee reach the Horizon League tournament championship game. Lundy said that expects to have Fields – who has missed a month with a broken finger – back in the next couple of weeks. The return of Fields will inject further quality into a frontcourt that’s leaned heavily upon Stillwell’s talents.
Pratt has already returned, and he’s made an immediate impact. In rejoining the Panthers’ rotation the past two games, Pratt has played 43 minutes combined against Green Bay and Akron. In that time, he’s canned six of his nine triple tries and given the team back a needed factor offensively. After he sank 70 triples a year ago, Horizon League foes will have to commit valuable resources to guarding Pratt, and that should only help his buddies.
“They really compliment one another,” Lundy says of his guards. “You’ve got those three guys (Fulks, McKee, and Pullian) who can all make three’s and they can all shoot it but they’re a bit more downhill, where Erik can really shoot it. He, at heart, is a great catch-and-shoot guy…his absence really let people clog the lane on us and having him back has really helped us space the floor. And the other thing is that when you see a guy who can really shoot the ball, and you see it going in, it sort of becomes contagious. And it makes it easier for the next guy to start seeing it go in.”
Healthy and cohesive, the experienced Panthers are feeling good about where they’re headed. After playing well in elimination settings at the CBI and in last year’s Horizon League tournament, the Panthers succeeded in this year’s Cream City Classic and the inaugural MKE Tip-Off. To Fulks, the wins they’ve earned lately is evidence that this group is getting ready to rip off more wins once March arrives.
“The Cream City Classic played a huge role in what we’re trying to do,” Fulks said, looking back. “Playing three really good teams in three back-to-back days, and three really good teams that play really different styles of basketball….we got down in those games, but we were resilient, we came back, we fought, and that shows that championship pedigree that’s in us.”
Milwaukee next takes the floor on Sunday afternoon against Division III North Central (IL) College. After that and a home tilt against the new-look IU Indy Jaguars, the Panthers will face three straight road contests at Oakland, Detroit Mercy, and Purdue Fort Wayne. It’s a tough stretch that could reveal a lot about where Milwaukee is headed later on this season. With confidence riding high, the Panthers look ready to throw down their gauntlet in conference play.
