Name a college basketball team that opened the season by losing two of three games at the Maui Classic. Hint: The team has a center named Manning.
That’s easy. Kansas.
Yes, but there’s another correct answer, too.
Like the Jayhawks, Nebraska dropped two of three in Hawaii over Thanksgiving, and the Huskers have Pete Manning – no relation to you-know-who – in the post.
Thus it will be a battle of Mannings in the middle when Kansas and Nebraska resume Big Eight Conference action on Wednesday night in Lincoln.
Tipoff is 8:08 p.m. at the Devaney Center. A live telecast will be available in the Lawrence area on channels 13 and 41.
Pete Manning is a 6-8 junior out of Seminole, Okla., Junior College – Archie Marshall’s school – via Trenton, N.J. A native of Jamaica, Manning leads the Huskers in field goal percentage (55.3) and is the club’s second-leading rebounder (4.9).
Kansas All-American Danny Manning, on the other hand, is second in the Big Eight in scoring (23.6) and second in field goal percentage (60.2) despite seeing a constant diet of sagging zone defenses.
More pressure to score and rebound has been on Manning’s shoulders during the last three games because of the loss of 6-10 Marvin Branch and coach Larry Brown’s shift from a double-post to basically a single-post offense.
“You can tell they’ve been affected by losing Branch,” Nebraska coach Danny Nee said, “but they’ll adjust.”
Since losing Branch, Kansas is 1-2 with losses to Iowa State and Notre Dame on the road and a win over Div. II Hampton at home. Now Nebraska looms as still another tough road trip.
“It’s hard to win on the road in this league,” KU coach Larry Brown remarked. “We lost a heartbreaker there last year.”
Nebraska, in fact, defeated a Brown-coached Kansas team for the first time ever when Derrick Vick scored with :01 remaining in overtime for an 83-81 triumph in the last game of the 1986-87 regular season. Brown was 8-0 against the Huskers going into that one.
That was a strong Nebraska team, too. It wound up with 21 victories and was one of the final four teams in the NIT. This year’s edition of the Cornhuskers has been perplexing.
For instance, Nebraska lost at home to Grambling, then came back and stunned defending Big Eight champion Missouri, 70-68. Next time out, however, Iowa State waxed ’em by 38 points in Ames.
Nee is pointing the finger of inconsistency at his seniors – Vick, Henry T. Buchanan and Jeff Rekeweg, all of whom incidentally were first-year juco transfers last season.
“We need better play from our seniors if we’re gonna have any affect in the Big Eight at all,” said NU’s second-year coach. “They haven’t been giving us the leadership we need.”
Nee hasn’t built this team around one player, that’s for sure. Vick, a 6-6 forward, is the only Husker averaging in double figures (11.6). Otherwise, five NU players are scoring between 8.2 and 9.3 points a game.
None of Nebraska’s five starters began their college careers in Lincoln. Four – Vick, Rekeweg, Buchanan and Manning – are jucos while 6-2 junior guard Eric Johnson is a transfer from Baylor.
Buchanan is the oldest player in the Big Eight at 27.
Notes
Kansas ranks in the top 10 nationally in both shooting (53.1) and field goal defense (40.8)…Rekeweg is the Big Eight’s top free throw shooter at 88.4 percent…KU hasn’t played a league foe in two weeks.
