Moments That Popped: No. 2 Iowa State 74, No. 9 Kansas 57

Ames, Iowa — The Kansas men’s basketball team had a golden opportunity to pick up a huge Big 12 Conference road win on Wednesday night at Hilton Coliseum, but as so many Kansas teams had found out before them, winning in Ames is no easy task.

It’s even harder when you don’t play all that well. And the 9th-ranked Jayhawks didn’t, at least not enough and not consistently, in falling to No. 2 Iowa State, 74-57.

The Jayhawks trailed by 10 at halftime following an 8-0 ISU run to close the half and then battled throughout the second half, cutting into the ISU lead multiple times and getting it to as low as four or five points with possession. But Kansas could not make the big play when it needed to most and ISU almost always seemed to find a way.

With just over 7 minutes to play in the 2nd half, Iowa State pushed its lead back to 10 points, erasing all of the work the Jayhawks had done in the first 13 minutes of the second half.

The rest of the way, the lead was far too big and KU far too exhausted to find a way to get over the hump.

Zeke Mayo led Kansas with 17 points on 7-of-19 shooting and no other KU player reached double figures in scoring.

Next up, KU (12-4 overall, 3-2 Big 12) will return home to take on in-state rival Kansas State at noon on Saturday at Allen Fieldhouse.

The Wildcats will enter that game at 7-9 overall and 1-4 in Big 12 play.

Here’s a look back at some of Wednesday’s action in Ames.

LIKES

• Better in the 2nd half… kind of – For a good chunk of Wednesday’s second half, the Kansas defense played much better than it did in giving up 40 points in the first half, continuing a recent trend that had turned positive for this Kansas team. KU gave up just 17 points through the first 15 minutes of the second half, using effort, intensity and smarter play to help hold Iowa State at bay. It didn’t last, though, as Iowa State scored 17 more points in the final 5 minutes of the game to put the game away. It won’t matter much, and there were plenty of moments in the second half that will look pretty ugly on film. But, at least for a while, the Jayhawks looked better and found a way to hang around thanks to their effort on the defensive end.

• Freshman competes – It was another rough night for AJ Storr, who played little, didn’t do much while he was out there and did not do himself any favors in the eyes of his head coach. With foul trouble lingering and Storr on the bench, KU coach Bill Self turned to freshman Rakease Passmore for some big first half minutes and the freshman more than held his own. It wasn’t overly pretty or anything to write home about. But the kid competed hard during his limited minutes in a tough environment and big time college basketball game.

• Bench support – The media seats at Iowa State are some of the best in the country because they allow us an up-close look at the KU bench during the action. We’re in the corner along the baseline, next to the KU bench, and you can see and hear so much more there than you can from pretty much any other vantage point. While that leads to some interesting revelations about the action on the court or the thoughts on the bench, it also allowed for a good look at the support offered by KU guards Jamari McDowell and Elmarko Jackson throughout Wednesday’s game. The two were constantly up out of their seats yelling encouragement and telling their teammates what they saw, needed or could do in any given situation. It wasn’t just token words either. There was passion behind it and it was present throughout the game.

DISLIKES

• First-half foul trouble – Despite hanging in there with some make-shift lineups, Wednesday’s first half was remembered largely for KU’s struggles in the foul department. Particularly for the KU big men. All three bigs — KJ Adams, Hunter Dickinson and Flory Bidunga — finished the half with 2 fouls apiece, and Dickinson and Bidunga sat together for a long time, picking up their fouls earlyin the half. That forced KU to go to lineups that included KJ Adams at the 5 and both AJ Storr and Rakease Passmore at the 4 at different times. While there were elements about those lineups that worked, they certainly weren’t looks that the Jayhawks had expected to play for extended minutes and caused some issues, as well. Adams picked up his second foul in the final three minutes of the half and Dickinson went back into the game after that, surviving the final 3 or so minutes without picking up his third fould.

• Early turnovers – After taking care of the ball in road wins at UCF (10) and Cincinnati (7), the Jayhawks were much more careless in the face of ISU’s pressure and intensity on the ball. KU recorded four turnovers in the game’s first 6 minutes and finished the first half with 10 turnovers, with 8 of the 10 coming from KU’s starters. To make matters worse, KU opened the second half with back-to-back turnovers by Dickinson. Later in the half, after KU had trimmed the ISU lead all the way down to three, back-to-back turnovers by KU guard Diggy Coit stunted the comeback attempt.

• Dickinson’s start – It wasn’t the best start for KU big man Hunter Dickinson, who took a while to get into the flow of the game. First, he missed a jumper on KU’s first offensive possession. Then, he fumbled a couple of passes for one turnover and one near-turnover and also deflected a defensive rebound out of bounds to Iowa State instead of grabbing it. Dickinson also picked up a pair of fouls in the game’s first 11 minutes and had to sit for extended portions of the first half. His inconsistent interior defense, when he wasn’t fouling, led to some easy looks and wide-open buckets at the rim for the Cyclones. Still, his bucket with just over 15 minutes to play in the first half got him on the board and pulled Kansas to within a point during a high-energy supercharged first few minutes of this top-10 clash at Hilton.

WHAT THE?

• KJ shoulder injury? – There was a scary moment at the 15:46 mark of the second half. KJ Adams was body checked while chasing a loose ball and went down in pain, stayed down and then got up and walked straight to the KU locker room with KU trainers. Adams was back on the KU bench after 5 or so minutes and back in the game at the 12:22 mark of the second half, no worse for wear. For a player of Adams’ size, strength and toughness to be in that much visible pain and then to be back out there like nothing had ever happened was pretty incredible. And it did not appear like the injury, whatever it was, did much to take Adams away from the way he normally plays.