Update #10: Final, KU wins 97-60
Blake Young hit both free throws, but KU is still comfortably ahead by 27 points as the bench begins to clear, with Jeremy Case, Brady Morningstar and Matt Kleinmann now coming in.
Darnell Jackson scored yet again, as his big second half has continued, cueing the Rock Chalk chant with 2:25 to go. Cartier Martin hit two more free throws, as his point total now looks more attractive, but the overall product of his night hasn’t been that great. Matt Kleinmann came back down to hit a lefthanded hook in the lane, making it a 93-64 game.
Jeremy Case hit a layup after a pair of Clent Stewart free throws, making him the 10th Jayhawk to get into the scoring columns. Maybank went to the line and hit one more free throw, giving him a game-high 26 points. Brady Morningstar went hard to the rim and got to the free throw line after landing hard on the floor. he hit both to make it a 97-67 game.
KU put on the finishing touches, 97-60, sufficiently bouncing back from Saturday’s letdown. Brandon Rush led five Jayhawks in double figures with 18 points. The Jayhawks shot a blistering 55.9 percent from the field. Jermaine Maybank led all scorers with 26 points for K-State, who drops to 17-7 overall and 6-3 in conference play. KU now 20-4 and 7-2, will travel to Columbia, Mo., to take on the Tigers Saturday at 2:30 p.m. at Mizzou Arena.
Update #9: 3:28, second half, KU leads 89-60
Blake Young missed two free throws, symbolic of K-State’s woes all night, as KU took possession with 7:35 to go. Julian Wright then drove hard on Bennett to put him out of the game with five fouls, no points and a cold stare for the officials.
Wright hit both free throws, giving him nine points on the night. Brandon Rush was then called for his fourth foul of the game, sending Maybank to the line yet again. He it one of two, and then threw down a dunk on the other end in transition in which he face-planted afterwards, but got up casually with 25 points on the night. Darrell Arthur came back with points No. 11 and 12 for the game. Arthur then tipped in a miss to bring his point total to 14. Mario Chalmers after that ripped down a defensive board and was fouled immediately, putting him on the line with KU in the bonus. Chalmers hit both free throws, making him the fourth Jayhawk to find double figures with 11 points.
Sasha Kaun got himself back in the party with a second-chance layup, following up his own shot, but missing the free throw to go with it and keeping him at nine points on the night.
Martin’s silent night continued with two more free throws, now nearing half of his season average with seven points, including just one field goal. Martin then scored on a drive to the hoop following two missed Sasha Kaun free throws, as he is 1-of-4 from the stripe on the night.
Sherron Collins became the fifth Jayhawk to get in double digits in the point column with a slashing layup off the galss, with 11 points to go alongside seven assists. A defensive foul led the game to its final full break.
Update #8: 7:45, second half, KU leads 77-53
Jackson hit his free throw, giving him seven points on the night and extending KU’s lead back up to 23 points.
Maybank hit two more free throws, but KU came right back, with Jackson following up a Julian Wright miss underneath. He then followed a Chalmers miss, giving him 11 points off the bench and double digits for the first time since Jan. 10 against Oklahoma State. Clent Stewart came right back down with a layup, but KU is now cruising with a steady lead above 20 points.
Mario Chalmers then got a wide open by-the-book layup after Sherron Collins dished out his sixth assist of the game, and Maybank came right back with two more points inside with a free throw to go with them. He hit it, extending his career high point total to 20. Jason Bennett, recently re-inserted into the game, was then called for his fourth foul.
Sherron Collins scored his eighth and ninth points on a drive to the hoop, continuing KU’s push toward the century mark with a 77-53 lead.
Update #7: 11:07, second half, KU leads 68-46
Brandon Rush hit a three to give himself 18 points after the timeout, giving KU its biggest lead of the night at 60-37. Cartier Martin followed it with his first field goal of the game, subsequently the first of the half for the Wildcats as a whole.
Darrell Arthur put himself into double digits moments later, doing so for just the third time in nine conference games. Jermaine Maybank came back to hit one of two free throws, adding to his career-high, putting him at 15 points, but Russell Robinson one-upped him with another nifty move to the hoop, putting KU up by 24 points.
Cartier Martin hit one of two free throws to give himself five points on the night, and Maybank hit two more, but before Blake Young hit his first three of the game, Sherron Collins scooped a steal at midcourt and finished with a finger roll at the rim. Darnell Jackson scored two more along with a foul before the game went to a full break.
Update #6: 15:27, second half, KU leads 57-37
David Hoskins missed long on a three right out of the half, and Julian Wright came back with a nifty give to Russell Robinson underneath for an easy layup. After another K-State empty possession, Brandon Rush had a three blocked from behind in transition, but the ball stayed with the Jayhawks after going out of bounds. That led to Mario Chalmers throwing a casual lob to Julian Wright, who finished it two-handed with his back to the basket.
Sasha Kaun then spun to his right on the left side of the hoop and wedged in a hoop off the window, putting KU up 53-35 just over two minutes into the second half. K-State’s woes continued when David Hoskins went to the free throw line, missing both attempts. The run to open the half continued for KU with another Julian Wright dunk inside, again from Chalmers, forcing Bob Huggins to call a timeout with his team now trailing by 20 points.
In transition, off of another K-State miss, Julian Wright again got in the mix, this time floating a ball up to Darrell Arthur for an easy two to make it a 10-0 KU run to open the half.
At the 16:03 mark, K-State finally ended its drought, and so did Cartier Martin, hitting a pair of free throws for his first points of the game.
Update #5: Halftime, KU leads 47-35
Collins hit one of two free throws, and then banked one in off the glass after Darnell Jackson took down an offensive board, but David Hoskins swished a three to keep the KU lead in single digits.
Jason Bennett then wiped a Darnell Jackson inside shot, but Lance Harris was called for a foul after Jackson chased down his own offensive board and got the ball to Brandon Rush. Rush hit both free throws, giving him a team-high 12 points. David Hoskins followed it with an offensive foul on a push-off atop the key.
Darrell Arthur scored his third field goal of the game inside, and after a Hoskins miss, Sherron Collins took down the board, went all the way to the opposite baseline and kicked it out to Rush, who hit another three, giving him 15 points and KU a 15-point lead with less than a minute left in the first half.
Maybank hit two more free throws for K-State, giving him 14 points on the night. Jason Bennett then was called for his third foul of the game while trying to block a Darnell Jackson dunk attempt. Jackson missed the first free throw, hit the second and put KU up by 14.
David Hoskins twisted to the hoop and hit an acrobatic layup off the glass to make it a 47-35 game at halftime. Brandon Rush leads all scorers with 15 points, David Hoskins has 13, and Jermaine Maybank has 12 for K-State, while Wildcats leading scorer Cartier Martin has been held scoreless through 20 minutes.
Update #4: 3:28, first half, KU leads 36-28
Clent Stewart hit one of two free throws out of the break, and KU’s foul woes continued as Darnell Jackson was called with one under the offensive glass following a Rodrick Stewart miss from the wing. David Hoskins hit two free throws to make make it a six-point game again, 26-20.
Mario Chalmers hit his first three of the game from the right wing with a hand in his face, trying to again awaken the KU crowd. Keeping that trend going was a traveling call on Hoskins on the other end.
Maybank again scored, though, after a Sherron Collins miss from eight feet on the baseline, dunking with two hands in transition. Maybank was called with a foul on the other end, though, after Chalmers came up with the ball in a scramble. Chalmers hit both free throws, but Blake Young scored in tough fashion inside again, and K-State called for a quick timeout after taking the ball back in a loose ball scrum, trailing 31-24.
Hoskins slashed to the rim and went off the glass to pull K-state within five out of the timeout, but Darrell Arthur answered it with some glasswork of his own with a spinning move on the opposite end. Maybank came back, and took his 6-foot-4 frame to the rack again. He got himself to the free throw line and hit both attempts, making it a 33-28 game.
Chalmers came up empty-handed on a drive on KU’s next possession, but Cartier Martin, still scoreless for K-State, gave it right back with a travel beyond the arc. Brandon Rush took advantage of it with a deep three, giving him 10 points. KU forced K-State’s eighth turnover of the game, and Sherron Collins was hacked going to the rim after Rush saved a ball going out of bounds, sending the game to its final break of the first half.
Update #3: 7:55, first half, KU leads 26-17
After the game’s second full break, Julian Wright hit one of two free throws to put KU’s lead back up to 10 points. Wright then ripped down a vicious defenisve rebound off of a Blake Young miss from close range. On the other end, Darrell Arthur got in the scoring column with a bank from the right block.
David Hoskins scored his first points of the game on the way back down with a three-pointer, but Sherron Collins quickly responded by exploding to the rim for two points, putting KU up 20-9.
Blake Young got to the free throw line for the first time, where he hit one of two, and Sasha Kaun committed his second foul of the game after Collins again went to the hoop and missed, putting K-State in the bonus at the 9:47 mark. Hoskins hit one of two, and Maybank put in an inside two off the rebound. Sasha Kaun then took a Mario Chalmers underhanded dish in transition to score while being fouled by Jason Bennett. Kaun, though, picked up his third foul of the game on the way back down, and Luis Colon hit two free throws to keep K-State within range, 23-15.
Darnell Jackson missed a close-range two-point opportunity, and Maybank continued his smoking start with two tough points in transition, forcing Bill Self to call a timeout at the 8:40 mark. Jackson, though, made up for it with two inside right out of the timeout, but missed the and-one free throw with it. Julian Wright scurried for the board, and Jackson was again fouled and sent to the line. He hit one of two, making it a nine-point game.
Update #2: 11:57, first half, KU leads 15-6
Out of a break in play, Russell Robinson stole the ball from K-State under the Jayhawk hoop, but gave it right back by stepping on the baseline. The Wildcats continued to miss three straight threes, and after the third, Sherron Collins pushed the ball ahead to Robinson for an open-court layup, putting KU up by 10 points.
Brandon Rush then was the beneficiary of a Darrell Arthur steal, hitting an open three from the wing, giving him seven points and KU a 15-2 lead.
K-State called a quick timeout, and out of it, Maybank hit a pair of inside layups to quiet the crowd a bit. KU went a little cold from the field as Collins and Rush each missed deep threes, and Julian Wright, after Rush’s miss, was called for a defensive foul. K-State, though, came up empty-handed after it.
Update #1: 15:45, first half, KU leads 10-2
KU controlled the opening tip, and it took Brandon Rush just seconds to cut right on the left wing and smoke an 18-foot jumper, giving KU the lead right off the bat.
KSU turned the ball over on its first possession, and Rush again slashed towards the basket, this time finding Julian Wright underneath for an easy two. The Wildcats again turned the ball over, but Mario Chalmers was called for a charge while trying to feed Rush on the break. Lance Harris hit a jumper similar to Rush’s on the way back up the floor, cutting the Jayhawks’ lead in half.
Rush answered back, staying aggressive and hitting a deep two from the left corner, and K-State turned the ball right back over. Chalmers followed a blocked Brandon Rush blocked shot out of bounds, and hit a jumper from the top of the key to make KU’s early lead 8-2. After a Jermaine Maybank missed three, the ball went out of bounds off of David Hoskins, again sending the ball the Jayhawks’ way. KU continued to build a momentum after an offensive foul on Jason Bennett. Russell Robinson charged the hoop and threw a wide lob pass, but it was thrown down two-handed by Sasha Kaun.
Pregame
For the first time in a long time, a Kansas University vs. Kansas State matchup on the hardwood has serious Big 12 postseason implications.
K-State enters it in a most favorable position, while KU is still licking wounds from Saturday’s 69-66 home loss to Texas A&M.
Bob Huggins comes to Allen Fieldhouse for the first time as the K-State leader, and his arrival has caused an immediate resurgence in the Wildcats’ mens hoops program. The ‘Cats, despite losing freshman sensation Bill Walker for the season to a knee injury on Jan. 6, are 17-6 overall, and tied with KU for second place in the conference at 6-2. Since losing Walker, who was averaging 11.3 points and 4.5 rebounds per game, the Wildcats are 7-1, including seven straight wins.
K-State comes in led by the one-two duo of junior forward David Hoskins, who averages 14.7 points per game, and senior forward Cartier Martin, who leads the team with a 15.5 points per game average, despite having come off the bench in 10 of K-State’s 23 games.
KU is looking for revenge from last season’s home loss to the Wildcats, while K-State is hot, having upset No. 22 Texas on the road, 73-72, Saturday afternoon.
