Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Could Jalen Wilson Wind Up the Best Kansas Jayhawk of the Bill Self Era + More KU Hoops Thoughts

Episode Date: November 22, 2022

Thoughts from Kansas Jayhawks basketball last week after their win over Duke and narrow victory against Southern Utah. If Jalen Wilson keeps up this pace and wins National Player of the Year, would he be the greatest player of the Bill Self era? Whose Stat Line is it Anyway and building a Thanksgiving dinner of KU basketball players with Nick Schwerdt.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!LinkedInLinkedIn jobs helps you find the candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at Linkedin.com/lockedoncollege Terms and conditions apply.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!Underdog FantasySign up on underdogfantasy.com with the promo code LOCKED ON and get your first deposit doubled up to $100!SimpliSafeWith Fast Protect™️ Technology, exclusively from SimpliSafe, 24/7 monitoring agents capture evidence to accurately verify a threat for faster police response. There’s No Safe Like SimpliSafe. Visit SimpliSafe.com/LockedOnCollege to learn more.UpsideDownload the FREE Upside App at https://upside.app.link/locked to get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked on Jayhawks, joined by Nick Schwert, we are going to go over some KU basketball stuff. How good is Jalen Wilson? And I'm going to pitch kind of a, I don't know, maybe too daring of a question for Nick. I've also got some Thanksgiving KU basketball segments coming up in the show right here with Locked on Jayhawks. You are Locked on Jayhawks,

your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network. Your team every day. I'm Derek Johnson. You can hear me as well on Rock Chalk Sports Talk Monday through Friday from 3 to 6 on KLWN and Lawrence. Thanks for making Locked On Jayhawks your first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcasts.

And on today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks, joined by Nick Schwert, you can find him with the Wave in the Wheat podcast. You can also hear him as the producer of Cody and Gold on 610 in Kansas City. And today's episode brought to you by Upside. Download the free Upside app. Use promo code LOCKED to get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. Kansas in basketball squeaks by again.

And Southern Utah on Friday, 82-6. That comes right after a victory over Duke in the Champions Classic. I guess when you take a look holistically of what we saw last week, we really saw kind of the highs and the lows for this team. Does that second game cause you worry at all? I think for me, I'm just like in a month or two,

we probably aren't even going to remember it, but I don't know. Do you have anything that you have big takeaways from, from last week? The only thing I don't, I don't know if it would cause me concern but it's just like one of those things I'm going to jot down and see if it's still an issue in a couple of weeks is the offensive rebounding it for excuse me the defensive rebounding for Kansas

the offensive rebounds allowed to southern Utah like when when Duke kills you on the offensive glass and put backs it makes sense because you've got three of the top five players in the recruiting class. I guess only two of them were actually playing, but you got seven footers, you got athletes out there and you're playing undersized with the six, seven big man. Like it makes sense that you're going to get killed on the offensive glass. The fact that it happened against Southern Utah, that to me is something where I wonder because personnel wise with the way KU is playing, it makes sense. Your starting big man is six, seven. And the guys who I think we thought were going to play bigger roles this year, Ernest Uday, Zach Clements right now, they're just not quite there. And I'm waiting for that to happen. If it doesn't happen, is Kansas going to be able to manufacture more production

defensive rebounding because that is I mean I don't care what you think about stylistically what wins in college basketball if you can't grab defensive rebounds which is like I don't know maybe the most important thing you can do on defense then you're not going to be a great team so it hasn't cost them quite yet it didn't cost them against duke so i guess it's even if they would it would have cost them against southern utah you would have said well you just beat duke two days ago so i'll chalk that up to an anomaly but uh that's the big thing that i'm kind of looking at right now with this team yeah and i agree with both those i i also think like what you said with duke it's kind of a

unicorn team you're you're probably not going to play many teams who even have one of what their big guys are, and they have like three or four of them. Southern Utah is weird because they had the one like 6'10 center, but they played a lot of minutes with the 6'6", 6'7 guy at the five. I think Kansas, I said this coming into the game Friday, I thought it was just kind of a letdown opportunity. You just had the big Duke win,

and then this next week you're going to the Bahamas to play a bunch of different teams. I think they just got kind of out-efforted and stuff, and maybe that's good for Bill Self. But I guess the one positive takeaway from the game, Jalen Wilson goes for 33 points, and each and every game he just continues to stack up more and more, kind of that resume that says, yeah, he is going to be an All-American candidate. He is going to be a Big 12 Player of the Year candidate. Maybe he's going to even be a National Player of the year candidate maybe he's going to even be a national player of the year candidate and i got to kind of thinking on this have you

thought about it all that if jaylen wilson wins national player of the year this year which is like not that far-fetched from how he's kind of started things he could go down as the greatest bill self player of all time please right but think about it please elaborate if he wins national player of the year right he would now be one of two bill self players to ever win that award he would also be the only bill self player to both have that award in his possession and to have won a national championship in his career okay so who do you think is the best bill self player currently like right now is it frank mason because frank mason doesn't have the title. Is it Ochai? Because he does have the title and he was best player in the conference. All American. I think probably for me, it's, it's Frank. Um, I'd probably Frank would be there. Uh, shortlist like Sharon Collins. Ochai. Does it probably have to be the top three in some order? I don't know if I'm forgetting someone. So I think that both Frank and Ochai,

if you just gave me the top 10 players in Kansas basketball history, I think Frank's probably top 10 all time. Again, he swept the National Player of the Year Awards. Ochai's close. Ochai's right on 10 all time. Again, he swept the national player of the year awards. Ochai's close. Ochai's right on that cusp. It's so tough without seeing the totality of the season because that's one thing that it is, man. It's that when guys have seasons like Ochai just had

or that Frank just had, you're always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Not because you don't believe in them, but because look at both of those guys and Jalen's in the exact same category. It's not that they were bad players before. It's that they were not even Frank Mason as a junior was not even, I mean, in the conversation amongst the best players in the country, same with OJ two years ago and same with Jalen last year.

So it's such a massive leap from one year to the next. It's not like drew Timmy, right? Where you go from averaging 15 and nine, 16 and 10 to all of a sudden being a 20 and 12 guy. It's not like it was a nice gradual step. It's a, it's a massive leap.

So you're waiting for the other shoe to drop and it is never impressive enough until you get to the end of the season and you go, wow, he never fell off. Right. Nobody ever had an answer for him. So I don't, I mean, what, what's, what's Jalen averaging at this point? 25 and nine, 25, nine, and like four or five. Well, that's it. If he, if he averages 25 and and nine then like I'm all aboard man

but I mean because that's what you're talking about you're not just saying he would be the best Bill Self player ever you're talking about that would that if you're the best Bill Self player ever then you're one of the 10 best players in Kansas basketball history which would be kind of shocking to say but but you know what? That's also, that's the, that's the sort of path that a lot of these guys have taken. It's not like the, the Paul Pierce, Rafe LaFrance, Nick Collison path where like we just mentioned, like those guys were great as sophomores and then were even better as juniors or were great as sophomores and then we're even better as juniors or we're great as juniors and then we're even better as seniors it's more about hey you kind of bide your time you play a secondary

role and then all of a sudden roster turnover you're the man and then you run away with it that's kind of what we've seen with frank that's what we saw with ochi and if jalen does it this year then yeah but it's just so four games into his senior season it's kind of tough to wrap your head around oh yeah yeah and I'm not saying like it's it's guaranteed I'm just saying like if this does happen he wins player of the year because to this point through four games he just looked really really darn good I think that is a real conversation it's weird to talk about because you'd be looking at like think about it was Sharon Collins like his case for whenever we talk about some of the best bill self players,

it's he had the national title and then he had two unbelievable seasons. He didn't win player of the year though, but he had two unbelievable seasons with Frank Mason. It's he had the national player of the year, uh, season where he swept the awards. If Jalen Wilson won national player of the year this year, he would be like a combination of the two. If Jalen Wilson won national player of the year this year, he would be like a combination of the two. He would have the title from last year, and he would have the highlight season as well. And it's just, like you said, it's very hard to wrap your head around because if I would have told you a month ago

we would be having this conversation right now, you would, I don't know, you'd punch me in the face. In the first half of the duke game during the game during the game i bet jaylen wilson at 36 to 1 to win the wooden award by the next morning he was up to 12 to 1 so it's a little shocking to me that these books didn't consider the idea that the best player on the defending national champions you know might have a chance to be the best player in the country but But I mean, even the production that he's had, even if you thought he was going to have a big year, even this is shocking.

Just the amount of, of volume that he's getting in the numbers that he's putting up through four games. All right. We got more with Nick coming up here. I've got a fun little basketball segment in a moment, but first this episode is brought to you by upside. Inflation has us all thinking about different ways to cut back,

whether it's driving less dining out less or buying less from the grocery store we can all agree there's nothing fun about less that's why you should get upside with upside you don't have to cut back because you get cash back on every purchase it means more date nights it means more you can get at the grocery store maybe more sporting events that you can attend to get started download the free upside app use my promo code locked get five dollars or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more, then claim an offer for whatever you're buying on Upside, check in at the business, pay as usual with a credit or debit card, and get paid. In comparison to credit card rewards or loyalty programs,

you can earn three times more cash back with Upside. Upside users are earning more than a million dollars every week. That's probably why they have a 4.8 star rating on the app store. Download the free Upside app and use promo code LOCKED to get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. That's $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more using promo code LOCKED. So you've heard of the game show, TV show, whatever it is. Whose line is it anyway, right? Oh, yeah. I watched that

a lot as a kid. Okay. Well, this isn't really like that, but I'm stealing the name of it. It's whose introduction? Yeah, great. It's whose stat line is it anyway? I'm going to

read you a stat line. It might be from a game. It might be from a season, whatever. You can guess who did it. I'll give you some context to it, and then we can discuss. So the first one here, 16 minutes played, zero points, zero rebounds, zero assists, zero steals, zero blocks. This came against Southern Utah. Who would that be?

Bobby Pettiford that's correct bobby pettiford with the uh you know why snell so you know why i was actually like not even locked into this game i was traveling during this game but i knew that he was the only guy who played it all off the bench and i knew that everybody that all the starters played like 29, 30 minutes. So that was a total guess, but it was only because I knew he was the only bench guy who got minutes.

By the way, I guess what happened to like the depth that we saw on display versus Duke, like everybody's getting some run. And then all of a sudden for Southern Utah, that's when the rotation tightens up. Like I would have figured it would be the opposite of that. No, I don't know what to make of it because the bench, you got nothing from him.

You got that game from Bobby Pettiford who, you know, I'm still high on long-term, but I don't know what happened there. MJ Rice comes back and he's just quick trigger off the bench and went 0 for 3, 0 for 4, quickly gets pulled out. That's going to cost him. Because the volume in the North Dakota State game was insane too. I think he took like 10 shots. That guy is looking to fire when he's out there.

I don't think that's exactly what the coach... I think some guys maybe hear like, hey, we want you to give us energy. We want you to go out there and be aggressive. And they always... Every freshman basketball player ever is like, oh, so you want me to shoot every time I touch the ball? It always, every basketball, every freshman basketball player ever is like, oh, so you want me to shoot every time I touch the ball? It's like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

They don't think that's exactly what they had in mind for you. So that might be a bit of a learning curve for him. Yeah. And then, I mean, the big, big struggle off the bench as well. They have to get more from the bench moving forward, especially when you look at, you know, I don't know who the third option. You don't say four bench points isn't going cut it the rest of the season okay how about this one uh 12 of 16 so 75 from the field oh of six at the foul line kj adams that is kj adams two

for two so far i'm killing it baby yeah dude kj i i listen i'll tell you this right now if we're going to be doing this all season i i i promise you i will be the foremost kj adams advocate because like i already i already get this sense that people are ready to see like earnest sort of take over and it's it's not to the point where everybody wants him to play more i don't know i wasn't really locked in on twitter where people were clamoring for him to get more run. Honestly, the one I've seen more, because you're right, there's always this guy, especially at the early point of the season, that'll carry on through all season, where there's a subsection of the fan base that's like,

why is this guy not getting more run and this guy needs a playoff? Last year was kind of DeJuan Harris. Honestly, it wasn't as much earnest in that game. I think because the centers were struggling.'ve actually seen a i don't know a fair amount it's again it's a small subsect of people talking about mj rice over kevin mcculler and that is like a complete non-starter for me uh are you kidding me what kevin mcculler watch kevin mcculler for five minutes i said this on my podcast last week. Any game, just do it the next game. Just pick a five minute span and don't watch anybody on the

court other than McCuller. And I heard that McCuller, I didn't see the beginning of the game, but I heard he kind of struggled. I didn't even go back and watch it. Full disclosure. I only saw the second half, but that he struggled early. Watch him for five minutes defensively. It is one of the most impressive things I've ever, he might be the best individual offender Bill Self's ever had. And that's saying something considering you had Marcus Garrett on your team three years ago, that play he made against Duke when, uh, Filipowski was driving fast break. He's backpedaling falling out of bounds and steals the ball and somehow saves it. And that was the play where Uday almost threw down the pick

on the other side, I think it was. But that was, and maybe I'm confusing two plays, but that was such an impressive play. I love watching Kevin McCullough play. As for, whoa, as for KJ Adams, this is great for anybody who's watching on video. I think that it's easy to say that the ceiling won't be there for him because he's a 6'7 big guy and you want to see that true rim protector.

But it's very clear that none of the other guys are ready for that. Ernest is not that either. And Ernest is, he looks to be a little lost out there. He had that really bad stretch in the second half against Duke where he was just never in the right spot defensively. KJ is that dude who Bill Self has one of these guys every single year where it's not flashy.

Guys want to see the dudes with more potential, higher ceiling. But what KJ does is he doesn't mess up other people's jobs. He's not out there getting in the way. He's not messing up the flow of the offense. People can trust him. He's just in the right spot doing the right things, and that means he's going to play.

Oh, and by the way, is there anybody on this team who plays harder than KJ? Like, that kid's motor is insane. So whether you want to see other guys play more or not, he's going to have a role all season. Okay, last one for whose stat line is it anyway? points per game which is third on the team five blocks which is third on the team it's i know who this is i'm gonna go three for three it's dewan harris it is yeah surprise and yeah because he had uh i saw i was looking at his kim pom numbers a couple like after the duke game

and i was like it's like top 200 shot blockers in the country but uh he's been so good this year man and if he was good life is that sustainable for you is that sustainable that he is amazing obviously not the block no not the blocks not the blocks that him being third on the team in points per game maybe the nine points is sustainable that doesn't sound that crazy but I I guess two parts of that is it sustainable for him to be the third best scorer on the team and if he is is that a bad thing for Kansas um it is sustainable but I know I don't think it's a good yeah I do think it's a bad thing because because that's just not who he is ultimately I I still think McCuller is going to get back. Like,

I don't think he's been good on offense at all. I think some of it, like he's taking a lot of mid range jumpers, probably too few, many for my taste. Other people may like that, but I don't think that's his game. And I,

and I think he'll improve his shooting a little bit. So ultimately I, I wouldn't be shocked to see McCuller scoring numbers improve, but I think ideally you will just get more production from the big guys. That's the problem is we've said it a million times. You and I did it, you know, year after year after year talking together on,

on rock shark sports talk, which is that bill self philosophically wants to get easy shots at the rim. And the easiest way to do that usually is with big guys. Right now, they don't have that. So instead of having a back to the basket guy, the only way they're getting shots at the rim is when KJ or Ernest or Zuby are rim running and catching lobs or Jalen and DeJuan driving downhill

and scoring at the rim, which that's great that you're able to do that. But what is a higher percentage shot like long term? Like you want a big guy. You want a guy who's six nine who can go down there and dunk the ball, not a six foot point guard who is having to score off runners and floaters. So he can do it.

But I don't think that's what you want long term if you want to see this team reach their potential offensively yeah I agree and I was I was looking today I think Kevin McCuller is like 11 of 15 on on shots at the rim um I think on shots that are outside the rim so two point you know mid-range whatever and three pointers it was like five of 19 I do think that will get better uh obviously the the jump shot has been a little streaky for him in his career, but he was shooting well before the ankle injuries last year. And obviously, that's the swing skill for him. It's not just a thing for Kansas.

If he wants to be an NBA draft pick, he's got to shoot it better. And I think that will kind of come with time. He had the five turnovers last game. I know a lot of people, like you said, were kind of getting him on about that. But everything else is there. He has the trust, I think, of the coaching staff because he plays great defense. He led Kansas in rebounding. He's a good passer and facilitator, even though he did have the just five turnovers. I think there's more to come for Kevin McCuller, and let's not forget,

he is a newcomer. It took time for Remy Martin. It takes time for a lot of these freshmen, so just give it some time, and I think there'll be even more there for Kevin McCuller and he's already been in my estimation. Really good. I have one more Thanksgiving segment here for, for KU basketball or a Thanksgiving segment, I should say, to finish things up. But first this episode is brought to you by bet online, bet online.net is your number one source for sports betting information,

stats, news, and analysis. Get the latest odds and trends for every professional and amateur league out there, from football to basketball to soccer, eSports. They've got it all at betonline.net. And if you love sports podcasts, you can find those at BetOnline as well. You can bet on Team USA in the World Cup. They just had a draw with Wales. I don't know if you want them against England to be patriotic.

You can bet on Kansas plus 12 against state in saturday's regular season finale or you can bet on anything with kansas in the battle for atlantis last i saw they were going at plus 250 with tennessee to win it uh you can bet them on any of the individual games as well with nc state first up they are the fastest and easiest way to get your betting fix head to bet online.net to the website or you can use your mobile device to learn more bet online where the game starts all right finishing things off here nick i've got a thanksgiving i guess kind of themed segment here um i want you to turn a thanksgiving meal into some kansas basketball players so i'll get you started here jaylen wilson is the turkey of the team right he's the center of the show um i think some people think turkey's overrated

okay well well you can you can make your own meal however you want um dewan harris for me i would say is the gravy right he's he just kind of goes with everything he's not maybe the star of the show but you can put him on anything you can work with anything it works maybe Ernest Uday and Zuby Ejifer is like a pie that somebody forgot to put in the oven like it looks like it's gonna be really good but it's not done yet I don't know maybe uh maybe Bill Self coming back is the uncle that's like saying stuff to you at the dinner I don't know make it make your Thanksgiving meal so okay um I'm actually gonna say that i'm gonna say that jaylen wilson is the mashed potatoes has to it has to happen you have you have to have jaylen wilson play well because of how much you're asking him to do just like you have to have mashed potatoes on your thanksgiving plate i don't really

care what else you have turkey dark, dark meat, rameon. You can even go with ham for all I care. Stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, don't care. The mashed potatoes for me are a must. It starts with mashed potatoes. And quite frankly, I'm probably going back for seconds. I'm going to say Grady Dick is the turkey. Because when done right, the turkey can be incredible.

It can be the best thing that you've eaten all year. But some people don't know how to cook turkey, Derek. Some people overcook it. Like just oven roasted turkey. Sorry, not interested. But you're going to put a brine on that turkey. We're going to inject it with some sort of butter, some sort of sauce, put that thing on the smoker, deep fry it when done well. And it can come in a lot of different variations. It could be incredible. Just like Grady Dick when he's on, he's electric, but he's a freshman. So it's inconsistent and you don't know what you're going to get on any given night. Um, man, what do I go from here? I'm going to say that Dwan Harris is the Brussels sprouts. Not everybody likes Brussels sprouts. I get it, but I do. And I think Brussels sprouts can be,

you know, they can tie your meal together. And there's some people go green beans. So you, if you're a green bean person, if you're an asparagus person, then you can make him your greens, but you need to have them because it's good for you. You may not love them. It's not going to be your favorite thing on the meal, but you want to be a little bit healthy. Just like with the one Harris, he's not your favorite player. He's not ever, you're going to be the guy where you say, you know what? He's my favorite. He's the best player on the court, but you need him. You need a point guard. You need somebody to steer the ship. You need him to sort of be the orchestrator on offense. And then, you know what? I'm going to say that I'm not going

to give one to everybody. Cause this would take way too long. No, no. The last one I want to give out is the cornbread muffins. And the cornbread, I'm struggling with this one. I'm going to say MJ Rice is the cornbread muffin, okay? Because you don't always get the cornbread muffin. I mean, some people go pumpkin pie. I want cornbread muffins. So, you know, he only played two games. So like some days he may not even be there.

And you say, wait a minute, who was supposed to bring MJ? Who was supposed to bring the cornbread muffins? Did nobody speak for this? Because I thought we were getting cornbread muffins. And then all of a sudden, nobody put the cornbread muffins on the plane to go to Indianapolis. What's the deal? What's the story? Why aren't the cornbread muffins at every Thanksgiving?

Because they're a delicious treat. So that's MJ Rice. So I got four for you. I hope I did well. I like it. I like it. I like it. We didn't get any cranberry, which I found out is Lance Leipold's favorite. No, because that's why I'm not going to talk trash on anybody like that.

Because I don't think the cranberry should be present. And I'm not going to look at any of the KU players and say they shouldn't even be on the team. Wow. I don't like cranberry either. But hey, stuffing. Stuffing is best for me. No, also i don't care for stuffing so wow that's that's bad i made a good plate i had turkey you did but like stuffing is like bread i don't know kevin mccullers hawaiian rolls i feel like you have a lot of starch in your Thanksgiving meal.

Mashed potatoes, cornbread. I got the turkey and the Brussels sprouts, though. It's fairly healthy. Yeah, just get a little green on there. You're good to go. Well, Nick, appreciate it as always. Anything you want to plug with Waving the Weed or 610? Yeah, we got Waving the Weed episodes coming out every single week.

And Cody and Gold on 610 every day from 10 to 2. All right, awesome. That's Nick Schwert. You can give him a follow as well, at Nick underscore Schwert. You can see it on YouTube as well. That's going to do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. Come on tomorrow's show. We are going to look ahead to kind of the battle for Atlantis

and start previewing things there. You can reach out to me at D Johnson radio or comment on YouTube. If you have anything you want us to discuss, don't forget to subscribe to the show. So you're getting all the latest wherever you get your podcast or with YouTube. That'll do it for today's episode. Have a good rest of your day. I'll see some of you on Rock Chalk Sports Talk later today.

Bye.