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Friday, March 23, 2007

A real dog fight

KU survives battle with Salukis, advances to Elite Eight

By Mark Fagan

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San Jose, Calif. — Barbara Lauter knows her Jayhawks are still a game away from the Final Four, and three games from an elusive national title.

But now that Kansas University has stretched its winning streak to 14 games with Thursday's 61-58 bruiser over Southern Illinois, she's already looking forward to spending much of next week - and through the weekend, for that matter - in Atlanta, where she's had a two-room suite at a hotel in Buckhead reserved for nearly a year.

KU is an elite program, she said, deserving of accommodations at the top of college basketball.

"It's who we are," said the Lawrence resident, sporting a KU visor, KU earrings, two KU face decals, a KU shirt, crimson-and-blue nail polish and, in the middle of it all, a gold medallion studded with diamonds that spell KU. "We're not Syracuse, who went to the NIT. We're not Maryland, who barely made the NCAA Tournament and probably shouldn't have, and then lost early.

"We are who we are, and we can always be proud of it."

The Kansas fans who made it to HP Pavilion - those who snapped up 1,250 tickets through the university, some of the 1,000 or so available this week at the arena box office or others available through brokers and similar outlets - know that only half of their work is done.

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NCAA Tourney: KU vs SIU

They're at the midpoint of the West regional, with the final set for 6:05 p.m. Saturday against UCLA. And they're halfway to a national championship, to be settled April 2 at the Georgia Dome.

"We need to win," said Tom Low, a 1997 KU grad who lives north of San Jose. "We need to get to the Final Four and win a championship. It's been too long."

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2006-07 March 22 KU-SIU Hoops

NCAA Tournament

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Comments

mcoan (anonymous) says...

I suggest that other J-W posters do the sportsman-like thing and visit
http://www.thesouthern.com/articles/2...
to post some good comments about the Salukis.

March 23, 2007 at 8:19 a.m. ( | suggest removal )

pilot100 (anonymous) says...

Free throws who's guarding me now? To win it all this problem must be solved.

March 23, 2007 at 1:10 p.m. ( | suggest removal )

spacystaci8 (anonymous) says...

That game scared the bejesus out of me. We need to work on free throws but I am sure we were shook up too. The Salukis looked great and I think will continue to improve and surprise other teams.

March 23, 2007 at 1:37 p.m. ( | suggest removal )

JayCeph (anonymous) says...

Numeric nuances:

KU has halved the seeds they've played in the tourny thus far... Niagara (16), Kentucky (8), SIU (4) and now UCLA (2).

Furthermore, their winning margin has diminished by a factor of roughly 2/3 (.66) per game... Niagara (40pts), Kentucky (12pts), and SIU (3pts).

What are the odds of such consistent 'seed/point margin' parallels developing in such a fashion? What are the odds that KU will pull out a 1 point win against UCLA on Saturday?

March 23, 2007 at 3:42 p.m. ( | suggest removal )

Jyhwk_InTigrtwn (anonymous) says...

interesting stats JayC. if the refs allow another football game like our last game, then 1pt win or loss even is not hard to imagine. if on the other they decide to call a tighter game (not likely in UCLA's backyard) the brew'ens should get into foul trouble and we'll slap their bench around pretty good.

but we gotta, gotta, gotta make the free throws. it kills me that we, year in and year out, allow the one controllable variable in 40 minutes of chaos, to bite us in the ass time and time again. in our 4 losses this year we averaged just over 50% at the line. we do that at this level of competition and we're not likely to win.

March 23, 2007 at 8:34 p.m. ( | suggest removal )

ralsterKUMed95 (anonymous) says...

Against KY, we were rather awesome (or 'above avg' for the non-KU-biased observer) in our FTs, if I remember right. Werent we 8 for 9 at one point? SIU made us work, and our guys really hustle on BOTH ends of the floor, and that constant 'hounding' DOES take its toll--it is why your shot suffers when you are 'dog' tired and we saw it on the FT line late vs SIU. Darnell is one of the best FT shooters on the team, along with Mario. Another game where different players contributed in different ways, allowing us to still come out with a win, which is all that matters right now--just win!

March 24, 2007 at 2:01 a.m. ( | suggest removal )