The Wildcats fall yet again in Lawrence, and it wasn’t pretty (again).
For most of the last 40 years, the annual trip to Lawrence has been a nightmare for the Kansas State men’s basketball team. And the house of horrors known as Allen Fieldhouse treated the Wildcats no differently this day, as K-State fell 84-74 to the Jayhawks to fall to 7-10 overall on the season, and 1-5 in Big 12 play.
K-State was out of sorts from the tip, and the Cats opened the game 0-7 from the floor while KU built a 14-point lead and never looked back. Even once the Cats finally started making some baskets, it was slow going, and it was nearly the half-way mark of the first half before K-State finally managed to hit the double-digit mark.
The Cats did manage a mini-run as KU took their foot off the gas early, and closed the score to 24-15 to force Bill Self to call a timeout to get his squad to wake back up. And, as usual, it was an effective timeout, with the Squawks come out with five-straight points to reassert themselves. A second mini-run later in the half also brought the Cats back to 8 again, and the half ended with the Wildcats somehow down just 10 at 39-29.
Probably the single biggest indicator of how poorly this game started for K-State, the Cats opened the game 0-11 from deep before Hawkins finally knocked one in, and finished 2-15 in the half. For a team that relies heavily on the three-point shot, that’s a good way to build a big hole. And it’s not like they were forced shots, the Cats misses came badly on mostly open, set looks.
The second half started much the same way the first did. Missed shots from deep by K-State, poor defense, and KU playing awake again led to the Hawks keeping the Cats at arms-length. David N’Guessan closed the gap to 8 right after the half on two made free throws, but the Squawks quickly pushed the lead back out to double-digits where their lead stayed until the Cats made a push to get it to 6 with five minutes to play. They managed to keep it there for a couple minutes, despite not making a field goal for over three minutes, thanks to making free throws. But KU managed to push it back out thanks to making free throws of their own, especially as K-State tried to foul late to stay in the game.
We learned nothing. Even really great K-State teams have been stymied in Allen Fieldhouse. And sometimes the bad ones have actually kept it closer. Heck, K-State’s last win in Lawrence, way back in 2006, was Jim Woolridge’s last team — and they didn’t even make the post season that year. K-State showed some fight today, but KU took large stretches of this game off (and were without the services of KJ Adams today) and yet the Cats never truly threatened.
K-State shot poorly, especially from deep, finishing 6-26 from beyond the arc. The Cats were saved at the free throw line, where they went 14-19 as a team. Coleman Hawkins finished with a 15 point, 10 rebound double-double effort, but made poor decisions at times and largely got beat by Hunter Dickinson on defense (he finished with a game-high 25 points). N’Guessan (13) and Max Jones (11) were the other Cats in double figures. KU had just three player in double figures, but Zeke Mayo had 24 to go with Dickinson’s 25, and nearly had as many 3pt makes by himself (going 4-7) as the Cats did as a whole; and Dajuan Harris dropped in 15.
Next up for the Wildcats is a trip to Waco on Wednesday, where Jerome Tang will likely end up with his first loss against the team where he was an assistant for nearly two decades.