AP PhotoAustin, Texas ? Blessed with the deepest bench in the Big 12 Conference, if not the entire country, Texas coach Rick Barnes will use up to 11 players in tonight’s UT-Kansas University men’s basketball game at Erwin Center.
The Jayhawks, barring foul trouble, figure to counter with about eight bodies, meaning UT could have fresher legs come crunch time in the battle between two top-25 teams.
“I’m not worried about that,” Jayhawk freshman J.R. Giddens said. “They can only have five players on the court at all times. They can have 13, 25, 30, 35 players … but when we are on the court, it’s five-on-five, baby, man-to-man, mano-a-mano.”
Tipoff for tonight’s game between the No. 11 Longhorns (19-4, 10-2 Big 12) and No. 21 Jayhawks (17-6, 9-3) is 8:05 p.m. at Erwin Center with a telecast on ESPN (Sunflower Broadband Channel 48).
“They have good players across the board,” KU coach Bill Self said.
They have so many good players that UT senior Brian Boddicker said they “come in waves.”
Barnes has noticed and rewarded almost all of them with significant playing time. Texas, believe it or not, has 11 players averaging between 14.6 and 29.2 minutes a game. Those 11 players average between 3.8 and 13.3 points per contest.
Barnes plays the guys who are competing the hardest on any given night.
“I like the word accountability,” Barnes told the Austin American Statesman. “I like the words, ‘Effort is not negotiable.'”
The effort has shown on the boards, a spot where KU has been vulnerable.
Texas, which leads the Big 12 in rebound margin, outrebounded Oklahoma, 46-30, in Saturday’s 68-63 win in Norman, Okla., a game that kept the second-place Longhorns a full game ahead of KU in the league standings.
“If you don’t have big, strong bruisers in there you better either be quick and athletic or big and strong,” OU coach Kelvin Sampson said. “Texas’ strength and its depth up front hurt us.”
The Jayhawks were outrebounded 57-50 in Saturday’s 90-89 overtime win over Iowa State.
“Can we rebound ball with their depth and big guys?” Self said, asking the question that could determine the outcome of tonight’s game. “We’re going to have to play tougher than we played and be better on the glass.”
If KU runs out of gas tonight, Self won’t use the excuse that the Jayhawks had to exert a lot of effort in Saturday’s OT thriller; four of KU’s starters played 35 or more minutes.
“I’d be worried about the quick turnarond if the outcome was different. This should pump some energy in us now,” he said.
Meanwhile, Texas has those waves of bodies to worry about.
“The best thing about depth is you have the best bench in the nation, I think,” sophomore Brad Buckman said. “When some dude’s not playing well, someone else will step in. The worst thing is you want more playing time. But who cares? We’re doing so well, you can’t really complain.”
“During the last four minutes,” Boddicker noted, “hopefully our opponents won’t have anything left.”
The Jayhawks are hoping to reverse their fortunes of late on the road. KU, which has lost at Iowa State, Oklahoma State and Nebraska in successive road games, last lost four straight road games in 1999-00 (Missouri, Iowa State, Iowa and Oklahoma State).
KU last dropped four straight conference road games in the 1986-87 season (Missouri, Iowa State, Colorado and Nebraska). KU, which has suffered two straight double-digit road losses, last suffered three straight double-digit defeats in 1954-55 (to Colorado, Oklahoma State and Missouri in the Olympic playoffs in Columbia, Mo.).
Before that, one had to go back to 1905-06 for three straight double-digit road losses, to the likes of YMCA teams Evanston, Chicago Central and Iowa Muscatine.
“We should have some momentum,” Self said of tonight’s road battle coming off an exciting win over ISU. “A win like this will help us in Austin, at least it should. We needed to win a game where we had to fight and stick together.”
Texas will be trying to snap a three-game losing streak to the Jayhawks. KU won last year, 90-87, at Allen Fieldhouse, and 110-103 the year before in an overtime game in Austin. In 2000-01, KU won, 82-66, in Lawrence.
“The last two years have been great games. Of course they’ll be ready,” KU point guard Aaron Miles stated.
There’s a chance the Kansas University volleyball team will attend part of today’s football game against Missouri, but the Jayhawks will exit early to catch their match at 7 tonight against Baylor at Horejsi Center.
“Coach is allowing us to go to half of the football game so we can support the other teams,” said junior outside hitter Lindsey Morris, “but he knows it’s important for us to rest and not be out.”
The squad may watch the second half on TV, but it’s a sure bet coach Ray Bechard doesn’t want his players involved in any postgame celebrations.
His team doesn’t need such distractions before it battles the Bears. It may have been acceptable last year when Kansas (9-4, 1-1 Big 12 Conference) swept a depleted Baylor squad that was missing potential conference Player of the Year Stevie Nicholas because of a knee injury; players had also quit and BU was forced to fill its roster with players from the school’s club team.
Times have changed, however. The Bears (9-6, 2-1) upended No. 10 Kansas State, 3-1, Wednesday, just a week after the Wildcats dismantled Bechard’s Jayhawks 3-0 in their conference opener.
That feat made Bechard realize Baylor won’t be a pushover.
“I don’t think anybody wants to go through the type of year that they went through,” Bechard said, “but obviously they’ve rebounded with tremendous transfers and some recruits and they’re very excited. It’ll be a totally different Baylor team than what we saw last year.”
In addition to Nicholas, a libero, Kansas’ biggest task will be combating All-Big 12 outside hitter Tisha Schwartz and 6-foot-5 middle blocker Desiree Guilliard-Young. All three have been effective while helping the Bears win their last three matches.
“Their last four or five matches have been very competitive,” Bechard said. “They’re very young and they’ve found a core group right now that they’re pretty excited about. It’s gonna be a very difficult match.”
Earl Richardson/Journal-World PhotoSAN ANTONIO ? Kansas’ Kirk Hinrich completed a spinning, 360-degree slam dunk on Thursday afternoon at the Alamodome.
Pretty impressive for a guy with a bruised left thigh.
“I’m moving around a lot better,” said the 6-foot-3 Hinrich, who says he’s close to 100 percent heading into tonight’s NCAA Midwest Regional semifinal against Illinois (9:20 p.m., Alamodome).
He hurt his thigh in Sunday’s second-round win over Syracuse.
“I feel fine. As long as it doesn’t get hit again, I don’t think it’ll bother me. I’m ready to go. We’re all ready to go,” KU’s sophomore point guard added.
Earl Richardson/Journal-World PhotoThe No. 4-seeded Jayhawks (26-6) are ready for their biggest test of the year 26-7, top-seeded Illinois.
“They’re the best team we’ll have faced all year and it will take our best game of the year to beat them,” Hinrich said.
The Illini enter with one of the nation’s top backcourts soph point guard Frank Williams and junior two-guard Cory Bradford, who some say will exploit less athletic KU guards Hinrich and Jeff Boschee.
“I don’t know where people get that,” said Hinrich, who looked pretty athletic on his shootaround slam, which thrilled a crowd of about 1,000 fans.
“I do not think our guards will be exploited.”
Earl Richardson/Journal-World PhotoBoschee thinks it’s a great, even, guard matchup.
“I think it’s really close,” Boschee said. “Kirk and Frank are pretty equal in talent and Cory and I shoot it extremely well.”
The KU-U of I tale of the tape looks something like this:
At the point, it’s Williams, a 6-3, 205-pound sophomore, versus Hinrich, a 6-31/2, 180-pound second-year player.
Earl Richardson/Journal-World PhotosWilliams averages 14.7 points and 4.4 assists, Hinrich 11.4 points; 7.1 assists.
“Frank Williams can do so many different things,” Hinrich said. “He can shoot the ball, get it inside, finish. He does a great job running their team. What he does and all their guards do is apply tough pressure. They try to steal every pass. Inside the three-point line, they don’t try to give you any more ground.”
Williams is one of the quicker players in the U.S.
“He’s at worst one of the top three or four point guards in the country,” KU coach Roy Williams gushed. “He scores, penetrates, has great hands, makes other shots for other players.
“He’s confident, but not cocky. He’s very sure of himself but not arrogant. He makes everybody feel a heck of a lot more comfortable.”
Earl Richardson/J-W PhotoAt shooting guard, it’s Bradford, a 6-3, 200-pound junior versus KU junior Boschee, 6-1, 185. Boschee has hit 67 threes in 182 tries and averages 11.4 points a game. Bradford has made 59 threes in 163 tries for a 9.7 average.
“He’s a shooter, very explosive, who really helps their team. He’s a good player,” Boschee said of the Illini sharpshooter.
KU’s starting guards have 340 assists against 168 turnovers. Illinois’ guards have totaled 181 assists and 140 turnovers.
“I feel good about our guards. Offensively they share the ball. They have as good an assist/error ratio as any one-two men left in the tournament,” KU’s Williams said. “They try very hard defensively, but at times physical limitations make it more difficult.”
KU’s guards have faced tough matchups before.
“We play against some great guards in the Big 12,” Boschee said, citing Iowa State as an example. “I don’t think Frank Williams is any better than Jamaal Tinsley. I don’t think Cory Bradford is any better than (Kantrail) Horton. We’ve stood up to the challenge before.”
A year ago, Hinrich outplayed Duke’s Jason Williams in KU’s 69-65 second-round tourney loss.
Williams scored six points on 2-of-15 shooting with eight turnovers and six assists. Hinrich had 12 points, six assists and three bobbles.
“Obviously I was real upset we lost that game,” Hinrich said. “But as a team and myself, I realized what we can accomplish in this tournament. We know what it takes.
“We will be ready to play. We will come out and play hard.”
So will Illinois.
Basically the same Illini team clubbed KU, 84-70, last season at Chicago’s United Center.
“We’ve got to match their ‘physicalness’ and compete,” said Hinrich. “We can’t get out-toughed.”
Marcus Griffin (6-9, 235), Sergio McClain (6-4, 230), Lucas Johnson (6-8, 230), Brian Cook (6-10, 240) and Damir Krupalija (6-9, 230) all are fierce on the boards.
“We just don’t have the width of those guys,” Williams said. “Sometimes those kind of guys just flex their arms and you end up stumbling five to six feet away. Our guys flex their arms and nothing happens. We’re concerned from a rebounding standpoint.
“Defensively the same thing. They barely put a hand on you to move you and it may not be perceived as being a foul. They are moving you because they are so strong. They are one of the strongest teams if not the strongest team we’ll play all year long.”
Illinois is also deeper than KU, playing up to nine people to KU’s six or seven.
“We’re a little thinner than I’d like to be,” Williams said. “But I’ve said 100 times, the timeouts are so long you don’t need to rest people by substituting. You rest them during timeouts.”
The winner of tonight’s game will meet either Arizona or Mississippi on Sunday for a berth in the Final Four. Time of that game has yet to be determined.
Waco, Texas ? Once abysmal, Baylor University basketball is better under coach Dave Bliss.
Just three seasons ago, the Bad News Bears went 6-24 overall 0-16 in the Big 12 necessitating the firing of coach Harry Miller, who went 56-87 in five seasons.
Bliss was brought in from New Mexico and led BU to four league wins and a 14-15 overall mark during the 1999-2000 season. This year, the Bears are 15-6 overall and 4-6 in the Big 12 entering tonight’s 8:05 p.m. clash against No. 5-ranked Kansas.
“They are better than they have been in the past. We have to be ready to play,” KU senior Kenny Gregory said.
Still, Gregory’s not ready to call Baylor a powerhouse club.
“Not really,” Gregory said.
“To be honest … I’m not going to say they are the doormat of the league or like the worst team, or anything like that. (But) they played a terrible, terrible preseason schedule. They did win their games and you have to give them credit for that.”
Baylor went undefeated in nonconference play, beating the likes of Liberty, St. Edwards, Hardin Simmons, North Texas, Texas Southern, Montana and Grambling.
The Bears did claim moderately notable victories against Cal State Fullerton, Rice and Arkansas-Little Rock.
“We have to look at it as another game,” Gregory said. “There are certain teams you can really get up for, and certain teams you have to try to motivate yourself to try to play.”
He didn’t say which category Baylor fell into, but the implication was the Bears fall in the latter category.
If Gregory needs motivation tonight, he may find it during pregame warmups while looking around 10,284-seat Ferrell Center.
A sellout crowd is expected, which is big news at Baylor. The Bears drew just 6,412 fans for Saturday’s 69-58 victory over Nebraska.
“The job Dave has done at Baylor is impressive,” KU coach Roy Williams said.
“They got off to a great start this year. Once you get in league play it’s hard for any team to keep that going. In this league, you better be ready to play each and every night regardless of where the game is played. We know we will get their best shot and have to be ready Monday night.”
Guard DeMarcus Minor scored 17 points and dished four assists to lead the Bears over NU. Guards Chad Elsey and Wendell Greenleaf had 13 points apiece, while forward Terry Black chipped in 12. The Bears hoisted 24 threes, hitting seven. Combined, Greenleaf and Elsey were four of 16 from three-point range.
Black, a 6-foot-5 senior, leads BU with a 15.8 scoring average. Minor, a 6-4 senior, is right behind at 14.0 ppg. Greenleaf, a 6-2 sophomore, tallies 11.3 ppg.
Saturday’s victory over NU has energized BU heading into tonight’s nationally televised game.
“Kansas is the marvelous team they always are,” Bliss said. “But it’s neat to come into the game with a win. I know our energy level will be high and our fans will be excited about the game.”
BU used both zone and man-to-man defenses to limit NU’s Kimani Ffriend and Cookie Belcher to six points on combined 1-of-9 shooting. The Huskers hit just 42 percent of their shots.
BU has held teams to 38.6 percent shooting. KU is hitting 50.5 percent on the season.
“We wanted to set the tone early and show Nebraska we’re not the team we were Tuesday night,” Minor said, referring to a team that fell at Texas A&M, 73-69. “We’re a good team when we have our heads on straight.”
The Jayhawks, who are in a neck-and-neck battle with Iowa State in the league standings, don’t figure to look past Baylor with ISU looming on Saturday in Ames.
“I always prefer playing in the fieldhouse. What we’ll face at Baylor … who knows?” said junior guard Brett Ballard, who hit two threes in 11 minutes Saturday. “I only played 11 minutes, so I don’t see fatigue being a factor for me, personally. I think we’ll be ready to play.”
KU is without injured forward Drew Gooden (sprained wrist) for a second straight game. The Jayhawks also will be playing a Monday game following a Saturday game for the fourth straight week.
“Like coach said, we have to step up,” center Eric Chenowith said. “We’re playing again on a Monday after playing Saturday. It’s a big challenge going on the road and we have to be mentally ready for it.”
“We’ve done this the last three weeks,” guard Kirk Hinrich added. “You can’t allow yourself to be tired. No games are easy in this league.”
Kansas University’s women’s basketball team will be short-handed for its meeting tonight with No. 21 Texas.
Junior college transfer Fernanda Bosi has returned home to her native Brazil and will not return.
“It is a shock and a disappointment that Fernanda has decided to leave the team, but we respect her wishes to return home to Brazil,” Washington said in a prepared release.
Bosi, a 5-foot-11 guard-forward from Western Nebraska Junior College, played in 18 games with two starts and averaged 5.3 points, 2.3 rebounds and 17.3 minutes per game.
Bosi said she left the team to attend to “some personal matters.”
KU (8-1 overall, 2-6 Big 12) and Texas (16-6, 4-4) will tip off at 5 tonight at the Erwin Center.
UT boasts three double-digit scorers: Stacy Stephens, a 6-1 freshman forward, and Tai Dillard, a 5-9 sophomore guard, at 10.7 points per game, and JoRuth Woods, a 5-10 senior at 10.6 ppg.
The Longhorns are winning with defense. They’re holding teams to 58 points per game on 37.8-percent shooting.
KU, which has just two victories in its last 10 games, has won three straight over Texas.
Kansas City, Mo ? It’s been bad news for Southwest Missouri State’s Bears during the month of December.
Second-year coach Barry Hinson’s basketball team, 4-5 overall, has dropped five of six games entering tonight’s Sprint Shootout contest against Kansas.
Tipoff is 8:05 p.m. at Kemper Arena with a live telecast on channel 62.
“Our confidence is probably as low as it has been in the program in a long time,” Hinson said Friday, a day after the Bears’ 80-76 home loss to Stetson. “We are really struggling.”
The problem is inexperience. SMS, which has had 14 winning seasons in the last 15 years, returned just four letterwinners off last year’s 23-11 team.
The Bears opened with wins over New Orleans, North Texas and Sam Houston State, but have fallen on hard times since including a 61-55 home loss to Tulsa on Dec. 5 in Springfield, Mo.
KU pounded Tulsa, 92-69, on Dec. 16 at Allen Fieldhouse.
“Had we won last night’s game, we’d be talking about what a great opportunity this is,” Hinson said. “We are more worried about us right now. As far as we are concerned, we are playing a great team. You look at the stats do you realize they are one point (actually, two points) away divided between two players of averaging seven in double figures?
“I have never seen that as long as I have been coaching.”
KU has double-digit scorers in Kenny Gregory (17.8 points a game), Drew Gooden (16.4), Nick Collison (12.6), Eric Chenowith (12.3) and Kirk Hinrich (10.9). On the brink of averaging double figures are Jeff Boschee (9.2) and Luke Axtell (8.8).
The Bears face a big disadvantage in size tonight. The tallest starter for SMS is Scott Brakebill, a 6-foot-8 junior who averages 16.1 ppg.
“We don’t match up with Kansas. Not anybody else in the country matches up with Kansas, either,” Hinson said.
Tonight’s game has special meaning for Hinson, who has known KU assistant Joe Holladay since Hinson was in fourth grade.
Families of Holladay and Hinson had Sunday dinner together once a month while Hinson lived in Marlow, Okla., and Holladay in Lindsay, Okla.
The two former Oklahoma high school coaches have competed against each other before. Holladay’s Jenks High team went 2-0 against Hinson’s Kelley squad.
“He is older and wiser than me,” quipped Hinson, who at 39 is 14 years younger than Holladay. “I’ve got a lot of good friends. I have very few best friends. I consider Joe Holladay a best friend.
“Joe is one of the most sarcastic and wittiest people I’ve been around. If you want anybody to just make you feel like you are second class, Joe can do it in the most wittiest of ways,” he added with a laugh.
“I believe right now, other than Rick Pitino, for college basketball Joe Holladay is one of the hottest head coaching candidates out there. I know I’m biased, but he’s the man.”
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