Some thoughts…from Boulder
Gary Bedore, Journal-World KU men’s basketball beat writer
“Russell Robinson had his best offensive game of the season, which helped the Jayhawks to the blowout victory.
It was nice to see Shasha Kaun have a good second half offensively. He proved even he can go high for a lob dunk.
Certainly, Ricardo Patton will have nightmares about the Jayhawks the rest of his life, but the good news for him is he’ll never have to face them again – unless they meet in the Big 12 Tourney.
Another good road win for the Jayhawks, who are 11-3 in conference road games in the Bill Self era.”
Tom Keegan, Journal-World sports editor
“It’s not necessarily easy to maintain intensity for 20 second half minutes after building a 16-point lead in the first 20 minutes.
The Jayhawks did it, showing they already are smelling the starting line of the NCAA Tournament. They play hard nearly all the time and smart most, but not all of the time.”
Inside the numbers
27.3: It’s hard to do much when you shoot 27.3 percent from the floor, and Colorado figured that out pretty much right from go Wednesday night. Even leading 3-2 in the opening minutes, the Buffs had chance after chance to build and early buffer on the scoreboard, but never could capitalize. KU shot 47.6 percent, which was more than good enough in an ugly bout.
7: Seven points from Richard Roby was a vast decrease from the 30 he dropped on KU in a shootout in Allen Fieldhouse on Jan. 27, which KU still won handily. He did not start the game due to disciplinary reasons, and even when he got in about four minutes into the action, he never found much rhythm. He scored on an and-one in transition with a little over five minutes left in the first half, scored four awkward-looking points to start the second half and, well, that was pretty much it as far as his impact. He did have six rebounds.
10: Sasha Kaun’s 10 points marked his first foray into double-digit scoring territory since scoring 13 at Iowa State in a 68-64 overtime win on Jan. 13. It also stopped a nasty slump on offense for the junior, who had just five field goals in the previous four games combined. Also, for those who still remember the Texas A&M game vividly, he was 2-of-3 from the free throw line.
14: Russell Robinson’s game-high 14 points made him the seventh different Jayhawk to lead the team in scoring in the last 10 games. That gives the term ‘offensive balance’ some new meaning.
13: Despite the margin on the scoreboard, it was hard to ignore 13 KU turnovers. A good amount of those came from unnecessary extra passes and failed fancy lob plays. The Jayhawks got a little too loose in the second half, and it earned a couple of sideline tongue-lashings from Bill Self, but the game was well in hand by that point.
Just in case you missed it…
Julian Wright’s most embarassing moment as a Jayhawk – maybe as a basketball player – came in the Jan. 27 throttling at home of Colorado. Instead of remembering the final score, plenty of fans remembered his botched windmill dunk attempt in the open floor with the score still close in the first half. It even drew some national mockery. Wednesday night, after a circus pass from Russell Robinson off of a steal, Wright faced a similar situation. The lanky sophomore sprung from the floor in smooth fashion and threw it home with two hands, clean and sound. Looks like that goes in the books as a lesson learned.
Hopefully you didn’t miss it…
Gary made a great point in saying Wednesday was Russell Robinson’s finest offensive showing of the year, but it also might have been his best all-around game. In 28 minutes, the junior guard scored those points on 6-of-9 shooting, he had four rebounds (three of which were offensive), six assists to just two turnovers and five steals. In a game where Mario Chalmers and Sherron Collins got a little bit ahead of themselves at times on the offensive end, Robinson was again a calming influence.
