Extra Minutes: Oral Roberts 78, Kansas 71

By Ryan Greene     Nov 15, 2006

What this means…from press row

Gary Bedore, Journal-World KU men’s basketball beat writer

“What can you say when you lose to Oral Roberts by seven points? At home, nonetheless.

I guess if you are a KU fan you scream. Horrors.

Bad free throwing, bad defense against the three, sloppy ballhandling – especially in the first half. Did I say bad free throwing?

No positives tonight, folks.

The only thing the team can do is show some heart and regroup and forget about all the hype and accolades and come out and play some ball.

Guess the S.I. jinx lives after all.”

Tom Keegan, Journal-World sports editor

“You wear a giant target on your back and you better be at your best when facing a good team with a great player.

Kansas was far from its best and Oral Roberts’ fancy-passing big man, Caleb Green, made the Jayhawks pay. Green had told his coach, Scott Sutton, he really wanted to play at Allen Fieldhouse. Sutton called his buddy Bill Self and made it happen. Then he made the very most of it and beat a team that couldn’t make its foul shots and its layups.

Green made his teammates so much better that they were better than Sports Illustrated’s choice as the best team in the nation.”

Ryan Greene, KUSports.com editor

“One thing that stood out tonight was the freshmen.’

Darrell Arthur tied for a game-high with 22 points, but never really had an offensive rhythm. All of it was scrappy putbacks and open layins. He really only truly created his offense a couple of times.

As for Sherron Collins, he didn’t score. After hitting double figures against Northern Arizona, he was absent. He drew a big first-half charge which could have gone either way, sat the rest of the half and never found any kind of life after that on the floor.

This loss in the grand scheme doesn’t mean a ton. It could be another situation where it’s a laughable experience come March. But one thing is for sure – the freshmen still have a ways to go.”

Inside the numbers

0: That’s how many points Sherron Collins scored, following up a double-digit regular season debut less than a week ago. He was only 0-for-1 from the field, but that can be attributed to sitting much of the first half in foul trouble. He never found a rhythm of any kind.

1: That’s how many three-pointers ORU’s Marchello Vealy had hit in his 13 career attempts behind the arc before Wednesday. He hit his first seven attempts in the Fieldhouse, and finished 7-of-8.

42: That’s how many of KU’s 71 points came in the paint. That wouldn’t be a bad number, but Self could only recount five shots outside of three feet that KU made the entire game. The surplus of points in the paint mostly came on second and third chances off of missed shots and layups.

10: That’s how many free throws KU missed. Only one fewer than how many they made in an 11-for-21 performance from the stripe.

Just in case you missed it…

Bill Self was quick to point out in the post game press session that neither Brandon Rush nor Julian Wright ever got ‘in the game.’

It took Rush seemingly to forever to crack the scoring column, and that was mostly because of how stand-offish he was on that end of the floor for much of the first half. It wasn’t until Green began running his mouth a bit that Rush woke up.

Wright, typically the guy who does a bit of everything, didn’t do much of anything. His 12 rebounds came mostly off of missed layups, and he scored just six points on a 3-for-10 performance from the floor. He also had six turnovers, and standing out the furthest was an attempt to go through his legs with his dribble in traffic in the second half, a move which backfired and earned ORU easy points.

Hopefully you didn’t miss it…

Even though he was a visiting player who drew the ire of the home crowd, Caleb Green was a joy to watch play. He constantly had a smile on his face, and both his verbal and body language sent the message that he was soaking up the experience for all it was worth.

He made it worth quite a bit with 20 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists. What was most impressive about his game aside from his confidence was the ability to pass out of the post-up position. Few big men at any level have that type of ability. He showed he’s one of the lucky few.

Yep, they really said it…

Russell Robinson on Marchello Vealy’s performance from three-point range: “If you told us before the game he would go 7-for-8, we probably would have laughed, and he did.”

Russell Robinson on the team’s inconsistent intensity and focus: “I think we got to the point where we thought we could turn it on and off, and that definitely wasn’t the case today.”

Brandon Rush on the Sports Illustrated jinx: “Yeah, I think I believe in the jinx now. As soon as the cover comes out, we lose. That’s one of those things I don’t believe until it happens (to me).”

Bill Self on his team’s inconsistent intensity and focus: “We’ve been bad since before the Northern Arizona game game. But then the switch came on that day. When the swtich comes on, everything looks good.”

Bill Self on accolades such as the Sports Illustrated cover: “We didn’t deserve that. What’d we do to deserve that?…SI didn’t have anything to do with us losing tonight. ORU had a lot to do with us losing tonight.”

Bill Self on ORU’s Caleb Green, who nearly had a triple-double: “Caleb Green was the best player in the game. Any NBA scout would tell you Caleb Green was the best player in the game.”

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