Moments That Popped: No. 16 Kansas 69, No. 8 Iowa State 52

It was an angry Allen Fieldhouse on Monday night, when the 16th-ranked Jayhawks hosted No. 8 Iowa State in a key Big Monday battle for both teams.

The Jayhawks entered the game on the heels of a brutal meltdown loss to Baylor in Waco. And Iowa State entered on the heels of a 19-point home loss to Kansas State.

To say both teams needed this one would’ve been an understatement.

To say that only one team played a game worthy of the win would not have been.

• PHOTO GALLERY FROM KU-IOWA STATE

• NOTES & NUMBERS

They weren’t perfect, and they had plenty of moments that left coaches and fans alike scratching their heads. But the head-scratching wasn’t over things like effort, intensity or defense, and, on this night, the attention to those things was more than enough for the Jayhawks to pull out a big 69-52 win.

KU’s scoring effort was as balanced as it has been all season. Zeke Mayo hit five 3-pointers and led the Jayhawks with 17 points. After that, Hunter Dickinson added 14, Dajuan Harris Jr. scored 12, AJ Storr chipped in with 8, KJ Adams had 6 and Rylan Griffen added 5.

And the Jayhawks’ defense, along with some good fortune, held Iowa State to just 23.5% shooting, including a 3-for-18 clip from 3-point range. Two of those three made 3-pointers came on their final two 3-point attempts of the night.

The Iowa State loss made it a Sunflower State sweep for the

Next up, KU (16-6 overall, 7-4 Big 12) will head to Manhattan, Kansas on Saturday to take on a Kansas State team that has suddenly started to put it together a little bit.

Tipoff for Round 2 of the Sunflower Showdown is slated for 1 p.m. on ESPN. KU won the first meeting, 84-74 at Allen Fieldhouse on Jan. 18.

Here’s a look back at some of Monday’s action against the Cyclones.

LIKES

• The Play of the Year… so far – You won’t see one any prettier than this all season. Maybe anywhere. And how cool was it that it came from the two KU players who have been getting absolutely killed by Kansas fans in recent weeks. First, Dajuan Harris Jr., dove for a loose ball on the floor and both saved it and controlled it all in one slick, sliding motion near the sideline. Then, after Harris flipped the ball to Diggy Coit in the back court, Coit threw a half-court lob to KJ Adams, who absolutely hammered home an alley-oop to put Kansas up 33-19 and blow the roof off of Allen Fieldhouse. Timeout Iowa State. That might’ve stopped the bleeding, but it also gave the KU fans even more time to roar with approval over the highlight play.

• KU’s first-half defense – They got some of their misses back on the offensive glass, so you can’t grade the Jayhawks with an A+ for their effort in the first 20 minutes. But, man, was it good. The Jayhawks had a couple of breakdowns, but, overall, forced Iowa State to take (and miss) tough shots and had great energy defending the ball. The KU defense made the Cyclones’ offense, which entered the game ranked No. 17 nationally in offensive efficiency per KenPom.com, look pretty average throughout the first half. Shots were contested, ball handlers felt KU’s presence and struggled to find space and driving lanes. And the Jayhawks contested shots in the paint from nearly all five positions. Iowa State coach TJ Oztleberger opened his postgame press conference by lauding the Jayhawks and Bill Self as the gold standard for the way a defense imposes its will on its opponent. Oztleberger said KU did that to Iowa State on Monday night and the Cyclones never recovered.

• Better start to 2nd half – After coughing up a 19-point halftime lead to Baylor on Saturday, the Jayhawks entered the locker room with a 16-point lead (35-19) in this one, leaving fans across the globe wondering if the Jayhawks would start Monday’s second half the same way they started Saturday’s. It didn’t take long for Kansas fans to get their answer. The Jayhawks came out of the locker room in attack mode in the second half on Monday night. And they kept their intensity up to the level that it was throughout the first half. That played a huge role in Kansas maintaining and even extending its lead rather than watching it disappear. Eight minutes into the second half, the Jayhawks led 50-27 on what was just a miserable shooting night for the Cyclones, who never found it, thanks in large part to KU not letting them have an inch to breathe.

DISLIKES

• Classless chants in opening minutes – You can say all you want to say about how KJ Adams has played, how KU coach Bill Self has coached and how this season has gone so far. Nobody’s above criticism. But to take it to the level where you spend your time on game night dogging a kid while he’s out there playing is a little much for me. Such was the case in the opening minutes of Monday’s KU-ISU game, when KU fans let loose with a loud chant of “Flor-y! Flor-y! Flor-y!” while the action on the court was ongoing. It picked up again a few possessions later, only to stop when Zeke Mayo buried a 3-pointer. And it turned into an equally loud “We Want Flory!” chant a few minutes later. We’ve all heard the chants for the walk-ons at the end of KU victories. And there’ve even been instances of fans begging to see players put back on the floor after returning from injury. But, in nearly 40 years of following and/or covering this program, I can’t recall hearing the fans chant for a player to replace a KU starter so quickly. The presumption here is that those who chanted were hoping that freshman big man Flory Bidunga would start in place of KJ Adams in this top-20, Big Monday showdown. There was quite a bit of frustration and anger spewed about when Bidunga played just 5 minutes in last Saturday’s loss to Baylor while Adams struggled and played 16. Bidunga was in the game after the first TV timeout (15:26), but the funny thing was, he was out there with Adams in place of Dickinson. This can’t become a this player vs. that player situation. And the fans should know that. KU’s going to need both of those guys, and all the others, to get this thing headed in the right direction again.

• Storr just can’t buy a break – KU junior AJ Storr got a fairly long leash in this one and even had some good moments. He hit a 3-pointer from the corner with the shot clock winding down. It was one of his ugliest shots and it went in while some of his best-looking jumpers have missed. So, there’s that. And he later picked up a hustle bucket on the offensive glass. But it was the flubbed layup in transition against no resistance that people will probably remember. Instead of giving KU a 26-15 lead midway through the first half, Storr missed the bunny and then got pulled immediately. The season-long saga continues. Give Storr credit for responding. He got another crack to play in the first half and hit another 3-pointer and played some damn good half-court defense, too. He finished with 8 points in 17 minutes.

WHAT THE?

• Offensive glass issues – again – The Jayhawks were brutalized on the offensive boards for the second game in a row on Monday night, winning the overall rebounding battle with Iowa State 39-38 but losing 17-10 on the offensive glass. That included a 10-4 Iowa State edge on the offensive glass in the first half, which started with the Cyclones grabbing six offensive rebounds before Kansas got one. Forget size and lineup combinations with this one. Offensive rebounding usually is and certainly looked like a matter of will in this one. Had Kansas cleaned up the glass better in the first half, this wouldn’t even have been a game. The Jayahwks entered this one giving up an average of 10 offensive rebounds per game to their opponents and the Cyclones got that in the first half. It was about the only thing Iowa State did all night that looked worth a darn. Give KU credit for most of that.

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