Kansas basketball coach Roy Williams received some congratulatory phone calls after Wednesday night’s 98-70 win against Wyoming — the 400th victory of his 15-year career.
One of the most meaningful calls came from NBA rookie and former Jayhawk forward Drew Gooden, who contacted KU’s coach after the Memphis Grizzlies’ 100-92 loss at Portland.
“He had seen the highlights on ‘SportsCenter’ that we won and he called,” Williams said of the 6-foot-11 Memphis forward who will have his jersey retired tonight at halftime of the KU-Kansas State game (7 p.m., Allen Fieldhouse).
“He’s a special kid.”
Williams believes Gooden will be touched by tonight’s ceremony, which will include the unfurling of jersey No. 0 in the south fieldhouse rafters.
“I think Drew will be really proud,” Williams said. “He’ll be very honored. He’ll be very happy. I think it will shake him a little bit to see that jersey.”
There’s a good chance Gooden also will be tired. The Grizzlies played Friday night at Seattle.
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Simien update: Forward Wayne Simien (dislocated shoulder), who has been shooting and dribbling at practice, will be examined next week.
“He is getting better,” Williams said. “I do think there’s a great chance he’ll be back this season. It’s something we are optimistic about, though it is guarded optimism. It’s something they are trying to let the body do the healing. If it does, we will get him back. If it doesn’t, I don’t know (if) we’ll get him back.”
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Stingy Cat defense: No team has scored more than 73 points against K-State this season. The Jayhawks lead the country in scoring at 88.9 points a game.
“It could be ugly, but I think one of the strengths of our team is we can win in the 50s and 60s,” Williams said. “We’d just rather win in the 90s.”
KSU coach Jim Wooldridge realizes controlling tempo will be vital tonight.
“You can’t get this (KU) team in transition and you have to take care of the ball,” he said. “This team likes to play out on the open floor like the Texas Techs and Arizonas of the world. They are just exceptional.”
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One-time mistake: Williams on signee J.R. Giddens, a 6-foot-5 senior from Oklahoma City’s John Marshall High, who faced felony theft charges after a shopping spree at a Wal-Mart but had the juvenile case settled before going to trial.
“Roy Williams is going to stick by a kid as long as it’s a mistake. If those mistakes become more frequent or are habits, then I do have a problem,” Williams said. “No doubt in my mind, J.R. Giddens will represent the University of Kansas and our basketball program in a great manner throughout his entire career. He is a great kid. You cannot find anybody in that school (John Marshall High) or that area that won’t say, ‘This is really a nice kid,’ and they all were shocked by what happened.”
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Jawbreaker: Freshman Jeff Hawkins bruised his jaw when he was clipped in the chin by a Wyoming player’s shoulder late in Wednesday’s game.
“I thought my jaw was broken at first. It really hurt,” he said. “I couldn’t shut my mouth. I couldn’t put my teeth together. I’ve been chewing gum a lot to keep it from locking up.”
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Kirk Hinrich has been through this before.
“My senior year in high school we started out 1-3. After that we won 22 straight games and a state championship,” said Hinrich, Kansas’ senior guard from West High in Sioux City, Iowa.
“I’d rather take bumps and bruises now, get things worked out and play better at the end when it really matters.
“This is kind of like a wake-up call,” Hinrich said of KU taking a 3-3 record into Wednesday’s game at 4-0 Tulsa. “It’s hard not to be discouraged. I’m trying my best to stay positive so my teammates can feed off that. We could be 6-0, but we’re 3-3 and have to take care of business every time out. We need to look at the positives. (At Oregon) we scrapped and fought like never before.”
Hinrich played a gutsy 39 minutes Saturday in an 84-78 loss at Oregon, experiencing no back problems, just cramps.
“I don’t think it’s really chronic to be honest, it feels fine,” Hinrich said of his back strain. “The only problem is my legs were sore (Sunday) from cramps. I’ve never had a problem with cramps before. I think it’s because I hadn’t done much the whole week.”
Hinrich will continue to receive back treatments.
“I think it’ll be a back that will be a problem for him the whole year,” KU coach Roy Williams said, adding that Hinrich is one of the toughest competitors he’s ever been around.
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Slow start bothers Nash: KU junior Bryant Nash on the Jayhawks’ .500 record:
“I can’t say it hasn’t affected me. I think about it all the time. I’m walking around, I’m like … how can we actually be 3-3? We should be winning all these games. It’s unbelievable,” Nash said. “It’s kind of embarrassing, but it’s motivating us. We have to pick our game up. We have to go out there and play. We have to dive on the floor for balls and get rebounds. We have to motivate ourselves.”
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Bad timing: Remember the play in the Kansas-Oregon game in which Ian Crosswhite lost his shoe in the Ducks’ backcourt and took several seconds to regroup? He finally trudged into the frontcourt and hit a deep three-pointer to give the Ducks a 17-8 lead as the Jayhawks were perplexed.
“It was one of those days of Murphy’s Law, if things can go wrong they will go wrong,” Williams said on his “Hawk Talk” radio show.
“That was our first possession of zone we called the whole game. I was expecting the kid to get his shoe on in two seconds. It took 3 hours, 13 minutes. We’ve got five against four. It was unfortunate timing. Look at the tape. It was our first possession in zone.”
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Give Collison a break: Seems not all of the Jayhawks’ turnovers were earned against Oregon.
“We are down four (points), throw the ball to Nick Collison. He turns around to make a move, they reach in and foul the heck out of him right in front of the officials and (it’s) never called. But that goes down as a turnover,” Williams said. “You’ll have some of those kind of things happen, too.”
Kirk Hinrich has been through this before.
“My senior year in high school we started out 1-3. After that we won 22 straight games and a state championship,” said Hinrich, Kansas’ senior guard from West High in Sioux City, Iowa.
“I’d rather take bumps and bruises now, get things worked out and play better at the end when it really matters.
“This is kind of like a wake-up call,” Hinrich said of KU taking a 3-3 record into Wednesday’s game at 4-0 Tulsa. “It’s hard not to be discouraged. I’m trying my best to stay positive so my teammates can feed off that. We could be 6-0, but we’re 3-3 and have to take care of business every time out. We need to look at the positives. (At Oregon) we scrapped and fought like never before.”
Hinrich played a gutsy 39 minutes Saturday in an 84-78 loss at Oregon, experiencing no back problems, just cramps.
“I don’t think it’s really chronic to be honest, it feels fine,” Hinrich said of his back strain. “The only problem is my legs were sore (Sunday) from cramps. I’ve never had a problem with cramps before. I think it’s because I hadn’t done much the whole week.”
Hinrich will continue to receive back treatments.
“I think it’ll be a back that will be a problem for him the whole year,” KU coach Roy Williams said, adding that Hinrich is one of the toughest competitors he’s ever been around.
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Slow start bothers Nash: KU junior Bryant Nash on the Jayhawks’ .500 record:
“I can’t say it hasn’t affected me. I think about it all the time. I’m walking around, I’m like … how can we actually be 3-3? We should be winning all these games. It’s unbelievable,” Nash said. “It’s kind of embarrassing, but it’s motivating us. We have to pick our game up. We have to go out there and play. We have to dive on the floor for balls and get rebounds. We have to motivate ourselves.”
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Bad timing: Remember the play in the Kansas-Oregon game in which Ian Crosswhite lost his shoe in the Ducks’ backcourt and took several seconds to regroup? He finally trudged into the frontcourt and hit a deep three-pointer to give the Ducks a 17-8 lead as the Jayhawks were perplexed.
“It was one of those days of Murphy’s Law, if things can go wrong they will go wrong,” Williams said on his “Hawk Talk” radio show.
“That was our first possession of zone we called the whole game. I was expecting the kid to get his shoe on in two seconds. It took 3 hours, 13 minutes. We’ve got five against four. It was unfortunate timing. Look at the tape. It was our first possession in zone.”
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Give Collison a break: Seems not all of the Jayhawks’ turnovers were earned against Oregon.
“We are down four (points), throw the ball to Nick Collison. He turns around to make a move, they reach in and foul the heck out of him right in front of the officials and (it’s) never called. But that goes down as a turnover,” Williams said. “You’ll have some of those kind of things happen, too.”
Kirk Hinrich has been through this before.
“My senior year in high school we started out 1-3. After that we won 22 straight games and a state championship,” said Hinrich, Kansas’ senior guard from West High in Sioux City, Iowa.
“I’d rather take bumps and bruises now, get things worked out and play better at the end when it really matters.
“This is kind of like a wake-up call,” Hinrich said of KU taking a 3-3 record into Wednesday’s game at 4-0 Tulsa. “It’s hard not to be discouraged. I’m trying my best to stay positive so my teammates can feed off that. We could be 6-0, but we’re 3-3 and have to take care of business every time out. We need to look at the positives. (At Oregon) we scrapped and fought like never before.”
Hinrich played a gutsy 39 minutes Saturday in an 84-78 loss at Oregon, experiencing no back problems, just cramps.
“I don’t think it’s really chronic to be honest, it feels fine,” Hinrich said of his back strain. “The only problem is my legs were sore (Sunday) from cramps. I’ve never had a problem with cramps before. I think it’s because I hadn’t done much the whole week.”
Hinrich will continue to receive back treatments.
“I think it’ll be a back that will be a problem for him the whole year,” KU coach Roy Williams said, adding that Hinrich is one of the toughest competitors he’s ever been around.
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Slow start bothers Nash: KU junior Bryant Nash on the Jayhawks’ .500 record:
“I can’t say it hasn’t affected me. I think about it all the time. I’m walking around, I’m like … how can we actually be 3-3? We should be winning all these games. It’s unbelievable,” Nash said. “It’s kind of embarrassing, but it’s motivating us. We have to pick our game up. We have to go out there and play. We have to dive on the floor for balls and get rebounds. We have to motivate ourselves.”
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Bad timing: Remember the play in the Kansas-Oregon game in which Ian Crosswhite lost his shoe in the Ducks’ backcourt and took several seconds to regroup? He finally trudged into the frontcourt and hit a deep three-pointer to give the Ducks a 17-8 lead as the Jayhawks were perplexed.
“It was one of those days of Murphy’s Law, if things can go wrong they will go wrong,” Williams said on his “Hawk Talk” radio show.
“That was our first possession of zone we called the whole game. I was expecting the kid to get his shoe on in two seconds. It took 3 hours, 13 minutes. We’ve got five against four. It was unfortunate timing. Look at the tape. It was our first possession in zone.”
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Give Collison a break: Seems not all of the Jayhawks’ turnovers were earned against Oregon.
“We are down four (points), throw the ball to Nick Collison. He turns around to make a move, they reach in and foul the heck out of him right in front of the officials and (it’s) never called. But that goes down as a turnover,” Williams said. “You’ll have some of those kind of things happen, too.”
Kirk Hinrich has been through this before.
“My senior year in high school we started out 1-3. After that we won 22 straight games and a state championship,” said Hinrich, Kansas’ senior guard from West High in Sioux City, Iowa.
“I’d rather take bumps and bruises now, get things worked out and play better at the end when it really matters.
“This is kind of like a wake-up call,” Hinrich said of KU taking a 3-3 record into Wednesday’s game at 4-0 Tulsa. “It’s hard not to be discouraged. I’m trying my best to stay positive so my teammates can feed off that. We could be 6-0, but we’re 3-3 and have to take care of business every time out. We need to look at the positives. (At Oregon) we scrapped and fought like never before.”
Hinrich played a gutsy 39 minutes Saturday in an 84-78 loss at Oregon, experiencing no back problems, just cramps.
“I don’t think it’s really chronic to be honest, it feels fine,” Hinrich said of his back strain. “The only problem is my legs were sore (Sunday) from cramps. I’ve never had a problem with cramps before. I think it’s because I hadn’t done much the whole week.”
Hinrich will continue to receive back treatments.
“I think it’ll be a back that will be a problem for him the whole year,” KU coach Roy Williams said, adding that Hinrich is one of the toughest competitors he’s ever been around.
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Slow start bothers Nash: KU junior Bryant Nash on the Jayhawks’ .500 record:
“I can’t say it hasn’t affected me. I think about it all the time. I’m walking around, I’m like … how can we actually be 3-3? We should be winning all these games. It’s unbelievable,” Nash said. “It’s kind of embarrassing, but it’s motivating us. We have to pick our game up. We have to go out there and play. We have to dive on the floor for balls and get rebounds. We have to motivate ourselves.”
¢
Bad timing: Remember the play in the Kansas-Oregon game in which Ian Crosswhite lost his shoe in the Ducks’ backcourt and took several seconds to regroup? He finally trudged into the frontcourt and hit a deep three-pointer to give the Ducks a 17-8 lead as the Jayhawks were perplexed.
“It was one of those days of Murphy’s Law, if things can go wrong they will go wrong,” Williams said on his “Hawk Talk” radio show.
“That was our first possession of zone we called the whole game. I was expecting the kid to get his shoe on in two seconds. It took 3 hours, 13 minutes. We’ve got five against four. It was unfortunate timing. Look at the tape. It was our first possession in zone.”
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Give Collison a break: Seems not all of the Jayhawks’ turnovers were earned against Oregon.
“We are down four (points), throw the ball to Nick Collison. He turns around to make a move, they reach in and foul the heck out of him right in front of the officials and (it’s) never called. But that goes down as a turnover,” Williams said. “You’ll have some of those kind of things happen, too.”