Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - DAWGS: Kansas Jayhawks Comeback vs Tennessee as Elmarko Jackson & Melvin Council Power Epic WIN

Starting point is 00:00:00 Bill Self's got some dogs in the house. KU comes back from down 12 in the second half, beats Tennessee. Third place is there. Some extra money is theirs. And this was one of the most fun KU basketball experiences we've had in too long. In a while. We're going to break it down. You are Locked on Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:00:24 Your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked on podcast. Network, your team every day. What's going on? Thank you for making the Lockdown Podcast Network, the number one sports podcast network. Derek Johnson here with Locked on Jayhawks. A little bit of a different digs here.

Starting point is 00:00:42 I am out away for Thanksgiving week, but that cannot stop me because Kansas could not be stopped with O'Marco Jackson and Melvin Council in the second half. So they're coming to you. I'm going to come to you here as well. KU81, Tennessee 76. We're going to recap the game, what went right for Kansas in this one.

Starting point is 00:00:59 And it was a lot of fun, the comeback and the display that they showed in a perfect 3-0 players-era week for KU. We'll get into game awards, moments of the game, all that, what this means, and more on this episode of Locked-on Jayhawks. And today's episode of the show is brought to you by Game Time. If you're probably going to get up pretty cheap tickets to the game, there weren't a ton of fans there. But if not, there's always next year, because it sounds like a lot of the Big 12 teams are going to be in it. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and you just go to Lockdown College for $20 off. your first purchase with game time. So Kansas wins 81 to 76 against Tennessee.

Starting point is 00:01:35 And, you know, it's just a wild game because I don't know, first of all, I guess something about gutsy wins in Vegas for Kansas. If you remember last year, they beat Duke in Vegas. And for a team that overall didn't feel that gutsy, that was a gutsy win. Hunter Dickinson gets ejected and KJ was great on Cooper flag. I don't know, maybe, you know, I've been very adamantly again. Brett, Yourmark, wanting to move everything to Vegas. Maybe we should let him move everything to Vegas,

Starting point is 00:02:05 because it seems like you get the best out of KU. That's certainly for fun there. But what a freaking win, man. I mean, what a moment for this KU team. Just super fun to watch. And that's been the thing. Like, I go back to the Duke game, a game that they lost, but we came away from that pleasantly, I don't know,

Starting point is 00:02:24 excited, content about where the team was even in a loss. And it's those types of process. moments that lead to results, I think, like this. And there were moments in the game where it felt like, okay, this is going to be like the Duke game where you like, you fought hard, you showed some good things. But in the end, they just had, like they had a Nate Amant and your Nate Amet, basically, Darren Peterson was not there, right? But it didn't matter.

Starting point is 00:02:46 And honestly, like, it ended up being crazier because if you think about it from this perspective, KU's three best players, I would argue. I mean, tonight, your best players were Melvin Council and second half of Marco Jackson and stuff. But like, KU's three best players overall this season are Darren Peterson, obviously when healthy, Flory Bedunga and Trey White, and that's been showcased so far this season. Well, Darren Peterson didn't play. Flory Bidunga was 2 of 11 in the first half, and Trey White fouled out late in the second half.

Starting point is 00:03:16 So basically in a game where your top three players were either out or hindered, you still beat a top 10 opponent in Tennessee. They came in ranked 10th and Ken Palm coming in. In fact, people were clamoring before this game happened. People were clamoring that Tennessee should have been in the championship game because they're like, oh, but their strength of schedule, they should be in it. And boom, you come up with a win against Tennessee despite being down and the odds. And honestly, like, I just remember at halftime, like I texted a friend.

Starting point is 00:03:44 I texted a friend at half time. Here's exactly what it said. I said, to be honest, being down seven, because there's 41, 34, when Floree is 2 of 11, no Darren Peterson, no Dawson, 30% from the field is a team. to their 52% as a team is kind of nuts. Like, honestly, only being down seven when those things happened, it's actually kind of good for KU. But the idea there was, okay, well,

Starting point is 00:04:07 maybe that shifts a little in the second half, and maybe you can make a comeback. Instead, it ballooned. Instead, it became Tennessee's now up 12. And at that point, when Tennessee gets up 12, it's kind of like, okay, you can see the writing on the wall, right? Like, it's like, this KU team is really thin right now with Peterson out, with Dawson out.

Starting point is 00:04:24 They're starting five as each of them has played. played over 30 minutes in each of the first couple of games, right? Except for, I'm not sure if that's true with McDowell and Rosario. I just heard that on the pregame. It could be totally wrong. Anyway, you know, you look at that. It's a thinner team who's playing your third game in three days, like more tired legs, guys who maybe are playing more minutes than we're used to because of some of the injuries.

Starting point is 00:04:47 And you could have easily seen it fade away against what, you know, coming into this game, you view Tennessee be the better team, right? They were favored coming into this game. And so with that moment, that's kind of what, like, it felt like. But then El Marco Jackson happened. And El Marco Jackson happened really fun. And that almost led to like a baton toss to Melvin Council happening. And this was, I mean, Jamarne McDowell pitched in as well, too.

Starting point is 00:05:15 And just the cool parts of those three guys leading this, right, where I mean, I'm a huge Melvin counsel personally, but I know there's been some social media disgruntlement with some of the shooting percentages in recent games will take that with what you got in the second half. With El Marco, clearly it's been very, I don't know, maligned to this point in time. And to have a moment like that for some of that I've always heard El Marco is a really thoughtful, good kid. Sometimes I wonder if he's like being too thoughtful on the court, right? And you see thinking too much.

Starting point is 00:05:46 And I had somebody reach out to me on Twitter saying, like, do you think Jock Vaughn is helping here? And honestly, like, it probably is, right? Like, Jack Vaughn's a very thoughtful guy and was able to translate that into a really good career. So is he helping on Marco Jackson? Yes, probably. And if you get that El Marco for the rest. I mean, that's probably the biggest takeaway here is on Marco Jackson's performance because Melvin Council is going to have other good performances as one of the starters. El Marco Jackson, if he plays like that moving forward, he's, A, a part of the rotation, B, he's getting huge minutes and C, it just takes this team to another level.

Starting point is 00:06:19 Like when Darren Peterson's back, if El Marco is that off the bench, it's going to be incredible guard rotation for KU. But just really cool. And then like Jamari McDowell, like having a guy who I'm sure a lot of people after his freshman year and even after last year when he redshirted are telling him, hey, you should probably transfer. You're going to get more playing time if you go to a smaller school. And he's like, no, screw this.

Starting point is 00:06:43 Like I'm going to fight it out. I'm going to see if I can win out. And credit to him because it felt like through most of the offseason, okay, maybe he's a little further in the rotation or higher up in the rotation, I guess I should say, than we expected. And to his credit, when the moments have been there, when guys have gotten injured or somebody else has struggled and he's gotten in there, he's taken advantage. And all of a sudden, he's starting the last two games and he's hitting arguably the biggest shot of this game by making the three to make it 72 to 68. Just really cool that some people who are maligned in a little

Starting point is 00:07:16 bit of different ways, get them to that point. I think overall, besides that run by El Marco, where he scored, what was at 10, 11 points consecutively, like the, not consecutively in terms of straight, but like of KU points. And he was awesome. Overall, he finished with 17 points and 27 minutes for KU. That again is the biggest takeaway. Melvin counsel is just so much fun. And for him to play 38 minutes in the third straight game and be better in the second half when you should be more tired than the first half is just a thing. And that's, I guess, something like Melvin counsel is a second half player. He is not a first half player to this point in this season. and I guess one of the negatives would be Melvin Council first half,

Starting point is 00:07:54 but the second half certainly, but he's positive here. But at Trey White, I know he obviously fouled out at the end, but before he fouled out, he was great. He had 14 points and six rebounds in 20 minutes for KU. So again, they made big part of this comeback or completed the win with Trey White fouled out. That is really impressive that KU was still able to do that. But his performance makes me even feel better about where Trey White is at. He's consistently putting this run of play together.

Starting point is 00:08:21 or it's not just one good game, one bad game. This is, what, four or five, five straight games that the Tray White's been really good for KU. So that's awesome. As far as some of the biggest negatives, just to quickly mention some of those, I mean, Florey's offensive game in the first half, it was better in the second half. I think really, though, it's not like a long-term concern for me. Not a lot of teams have as many, like, strong and long bigs that Tennessee has and the number of them. They had like four or five of them.

Starting point is 00:08:46 And on top of it, it was just kind of, I think, a learning experience for Florey. like in the first half it there were a couple times where he missed bunnies around the rim although I thought he got fouled on at least one of them if not both to his credit but I think it was just more he was just settling into you know deeper shots than he's used to he was letting the Tennessee defense kind of win so to speak and that wasn't his game but I think he figured that out a little bit more in the second half and I think Bill self adjusted certainly for the rest of the team I think we also learned that that KU's bigs this week this is a week long perspective like you look at the Notre Dame game, those are stretch bigs.

Starting point is 00:09:21 You did pretty well with the big men there, right? You think about the Syracuse game. Those are athletic bigs. You did pretty well there. This game, the bigs labored a little bit more. And even me saying that, like, Flory still found a way to inches away to 13.7 rebounds. Bryson Tiller, you know, just six points, but eight rebounds.

Starting point is 00:09:37 But certainly the 19 points from your two bigs on six of 19, I think the takeaway here is when you're looking at potential matchups that could cause Kansas more concern, maybe it's the rugged strong bigs that you worry more about than the other ones. Beyond that, the other biggest, I guess, negative would just be the Cole Rosario.

Starting point is 00:09:56 The three is really off. Even the one he made, he was one of five was banked in. You just want to see that tighten up. But I still do have hope that Cole Rosario is going to be a player down the road. And heck, like, as moments were fading with was El Marco Jackson going to be a player down the road for KU? Well, and that turned out okay. So give these guys time sometimes, and it works out pretty well.

Starting point is 00:10:15 But I think the bottom line is this. Bill itself has some dogs. Also, if you miss the Melvin Council post game, oh my gosh, you have to check it out. But this is a fun team, man. And after the Duke game, they lost the game, but I'm riding with this team. And I continue to ride with this team. They are fun. They're athletic.

Starting point is 00:10:30 And even in the moments that they've lost, the North Carolina game is just bad execution in the second half for a young team trying to figure stuff out. In the Duke game, it was, I guess you could just say, like, you were outgunned, right? You didn't have Darren Peterson, and they probably had more talent overall in the court. But if they're not losing or the moments, they're not. not losing or the games that they're whatever it's not because of the mentality or because they're not a fit for what bill self wants to do and i think it is just it's weird to say they're an aesthetically pleasing team because there are moments where the offense i mean they show 42%

Starting point is 00:11:04 today there are moments where the offense is clunky there are moments where they they can't score in the half court but it's an aesthetically pleasing style of basketball to me i love watching this team all right we're going to continue on with moments of the game stats of the game awards all that this is locked on jay hawk Thanks, joining us on this episode of Lockdown Jayhawks, and we are brought to you by Fandual Sportsbook. With Fandual, you can get action with the upcoming college football games that are throughout the weekend, NFL, obviously Thursday, Thanksgiving, big NFL day. NBA's back as well, and obviously, college basketball feast week continues on. Even if you miss the start of the game or want to ride a hot hand, Fandwell has live bets on everything from who's going to score next to make that fourth quarter comeback.

Starting point is 00:11:47 Plus, you can even combine your live bet. into a same game parlay for a shot at a bigger payout. Keeps every game exciting, especially when your team is making that late push. And Fandul has given new customers $300 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. So head over to Fandual.com, sign up, play your game with Fanduel. It's the official sports betting partner of the NBA and the Lockdown Podcast Network. Thanks again for joining us on Lockdown Jayhawks. Thank you to every day or is catching each and every episode of the show.

Starting point is 00:12:14 I challenge you if you were thankful for Lockdown Jayhawks. And I'm thankful for you, like honestly, though, seriously, like for Thanksgiving, everybody who listened to the show, like, thank you guys so much. Go check out the KU Utah preview. I know it feels like a bit of a slog after what we saw tonight with basketball. But, you know, help help me out, please. Anyway, okay, moments of the game for KU.

Starting point is 00:12:37 I think early on, like the Bryson Tiller Dunk was a lot of fun just in terms of being a fun play. But I really don't want to start this until the second half when El Marco had the, again, I forget if it was 10 or 11 straight. I honestly don't remember if he made the free thrower missed it. I think he missed it. So it might have been 10 straight points on the end one that he had.

Starting point is 00:12:56 But he had 10 straight of KU's points. He had a couple threes in there, which that feels like found money. But it just, he looked so common. And honestly, like, the one that comes to mind to me the most, I'm just going to call this right now. I don't know. Okay. There's a lot of good moments.

Starting point is 00:13:12 But the El Marco moment of the game, it was he stripped Nate Amman. on a drive. I mean, he's giving up like, what, seven inches on him, something like that. KU very clearly in this game kept throwing guards at him, which I think was a testament to Nate omens at 610, like guard skills. And El Marco strips him. And then it's, I forget if there's the next offensive possession, like immediately after, if it was like one after. But it was one of the most aggressive, confident drives that I've ever seen El Marco Jackson take. And he goes to the cup and he ends up getting like a there's a late contest from a help defender coming over that makes it a tough shot and he floats it up and in even if he missed it though sometimes the knock

Starting point is 00:13:56 on on marco is you're this really gifted athlete like be fearless drive to the lane and that was a moment where regardless of there's all he ended up making it is like he was fearless in that moment and maybe it just took a little bit of confidence to get him there with those threes and you hope that carries over but that was so much fun um i also think the uh the low key moment of the game was playing paul and bia i think you know paul and bia ends up playing three minutes he scores two points on kind of a loose ball that he picked up and and laid in that was a nice moment for k u and it was important but i just think having him out there for a few minutes just to give your your other too big lineup a little bit of rest and just to it felt like i mean if we're giving out an award in

Starting point is 00:14:36 this game we could give out the football team award to tennessee because like they play a little bit football and the basketball court, and just to have a little, like, oh, no, you've been trying to, like, Trump off with your size, okay, we have the biggest dude on the court. So, like that for a couple minutes and just setting a tone, I don't know, maybe I'm reading into it too much. The council run of and ones. He had, what, three and ones in this game? That was certainly fun.

Starting point is 00:14:59 And then there was another one where it wasn't even an end one where it was like a strong drive and a layup. And then I think if you're just looking at the specific, like, play of the game, it's probably at 68 to 66 and Jamari McDowell like step. into a three with confidence a few feet behind the three point line it was a good look it was the right job to take it but again you wonder if you're a role player in that moment like are you are you shine away from it and he was not at all and i appreciated that and i that's something we mentioned earlier this week i forget which game we're talking about but we mentioned how you know it was nice to see

Starting point is 00:15:29 jamari like he he i forget if he missed the shot before something but it was just nice to see him have the confidence to be like no i'm stepping into this i'm taking the shot when you'd see other moments where, you know, some other younger players or whatever would just pass it up after you missed the first one or something. And I think that carried over into this game. He was not afraid of that moment. He was not afraid of that shot. And he knocked it down. And yeah, I'll make that the moment of the game, the play of the game. But the moment of the game is the El Marco run for sure. Stad of the game for KU, I mean, shooting 41% from 3-7 of 17, a little bit lower volume. But that was, you know, KU couldn't have won without that. And obviously, when you were the

Starting point is 00:16:03 underdog here, you were going to need a solid three-point shooting game for a team that's overall not, you know, the best three-point shooting team. Also, 26 of 30 at the foul line. You were excellent at the foul line. So just overall, I think you would say the stat of the game, you could argue, is the shooting for KU. But also, I would point to the turnovers. Again, KU is not forcing many turnovers. I guess that's just going to be a thing this year. But KU only had nine. You had 15 of them last game, and now you're playing a Tennessee team that, you know, certainly plays physical defense. And you only had nine. That was a big part of the game, I think, for KU. So I think you could kind of point to either of those two.

Starting point is 00:16:37 And that would lead you in the right direction. Plus, KU, another game where they have eight blocks. That would be another one where eight to four in blocks in the end. But, yeah, I am going to go with the shooting for KU. That was pretty critical, obviously, in the end for Kansas. Our awards of the game, our dog moment of the game, we mentioned we're going to start doing this every game. I mean, a lot of dog moments, I think, for KU. I kind of want to take that Jamari McDowell one.

Starting point is 00:16:59 You know what? Let's just pick the Melvin Council in honor of him, again, you know, starting this. getting a billion and ones and continuing to, because again, it was not a pretty first half for Melvin Council. Let's see. What did he go in the first half here? Melvin Council in the first half was two of eight shooting. So that's actually better. There was 07 than the game before, so we're moving in the right direction. But the second half, Melvin Council was 12 points on nine shots with four rebounds to assist. He played all 20 minutes. So yeah, I mean, all the end ones he got were, you know, the dog moments of the game for KU. And then our last award here,

Starting point is 00:17:37 the comp of the game, comparison of the game. So, KU actually wound up playing, obviously, a different order, the exact three same teams that Houston played. And, I mean, if we're taking this step further, like Iowa State ended up playing Syracuse and just blasted them more than Kansas and Houston beat them combined. So, you know, Iowa State does look very good, tip of the cap, how they look this week.

Starting point is 00:18:00 But point being, Houston is the team who is the preseason pick to win the Big 12. Houston's won the Big 12 the last two years. They're a little bit of a different team, but they have a lot back from a team who played for the national title last year. Point being the bar for this year you would just look at in the early part of the season and say, okay, if you can be as good as Houston or better than Houston, you're going to have a good shot to potentially win the Big 12, right, and what's going to be a very difficult conference. And obviously, again, like maybe Arizona ends up being better, maybe Iowa State ends up being better, right? Maybe Kansas ends up being better. But if that's the initial comparison, if that is the initial, you know, line, the litmus test that you want to, draw. Okay, well, they played the same three teams. Kansas went three and O. Houston went two and

Starting point is 00:18:40 one. Kansas had a plus 26 point differential. Houston had a plus 11. So I say that not to denigrate Houston. I think Houston's a really good team. They have some young players. They're going to get better. I say that to say this Kansas team did all that without Darren Peterson, their best player. Sky's the limit for this team. And that's pretty darn exciting. Let's get to our game balls and what's next for KU. Thanks for joining us on this episode of Lockdown Jayhawks. We were brought to you on today's episode by Game Time. You can get tickets to the upcoming KU Utah game for pretty cheap.

Starting point is 00:19:15 Over on game time, college football is here, college basketball is back. You can get tickets to those over on game time. I'm looking for at tickets as low as $5. No kidding, $5 over on game time. I'm also looking in the end zone, section 115. This is listed as a great deal on game time. Row 10 for $48. There are plenty of available tickets.

Starting point is 00:19:35 and seats for the K-U-U-U-T-L game. You can find some of those great deals over on game-time. Plus, you can see the image of the seat view, so you know what you're getting into. So take the gaswork out of buying college football tickets with GameTime, download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code Locked-on College for $20 off your first purchase.

Starting point is 00:19:51 Terms apply. Again, that's promo code Locked-O-N-C-O-L-E-G-E-E-G-E-E-G-E for $20 off. Swipe, tap, Ticket-Go, download GameTime today. Thanks, joining us again on Locked on Jayhawks. And again, check out our KU, Utah preview coming at you tomorrow on the show. All right, offensive game ball for KU. Do we go counsel or do we go Al Marco Jackson? I think we do have to go on Marco because here's the difference.

Starting point is 00:20:23 Counsel, 17 points on 17 shots, again, mostly because of the first half. El Marco is 17 points on seven shots is incredible. El Marco also had one assist. He did have three turnovers. Melvin Council had four assists to zero turnovers. That's nice to have theirs. You would give him a feather in the cap for that one. But I am going to go on Marco.

Starting point is 00:20:45 Markos are our offensive game ball here. He was excellent for KU. And when Kansas was kind of lost at sea, he found the island, so to speak. He got them back within striking distance for council to be able to make the next move. Our defensive game ball of this one, okay, so you get McDowell with two steals and a block. That's three stocks. Council had two blocks, low-key. Flory had three blocks and a steel.

Starting point is 00:21:09 When you look at Tennessee, I go back to the idea, though, that Jacoby Gillespie, who came in, you know, put up big time numbers, especially in this tournament, he only goes five of 19 for the game. Now, a big part of that was just missing a bunch of threes, but do we look at Melvin Council for that and say,

Starting point is 00:21:30 I mean, there were times, I don't know, K.E was switching, it was different players. Gosh, this is a hard one. This is a hard one because so Vernon Kerry like was, or Jalen Carrie, excuse me, Vernon's his older brother who went to Duke. Jalen Carey killed KU off the bench, 11 points and 10 rebounds. So I don't really want to pick one of KU's big because the combination of him and, I mean, Estreya got 10 off the bench as a big.

Starting point is 00:21:54 Parra got seven. I don't want to pick one of them. I could almost pick McDowell. Again, you look at the two steals in a block and he had a lot of time to defending Nate Ahmet, who Nate Amant looked really good, hit some big shots. Nate Amant was still just five of 15 from the floor. So you know what? Let's go Jamari McDowell.

Starting point is 00:22:11 Let's give him a defensive game ball. And then our overall game ball is going to go with El Marco Jackson. I think you could actually argue if you wanted to. Again, you could argue Melvin Council for the overall game ball. You could honestly argue Jamari McDowell because the defense, if we're giving him that with the big three at the end. But yeah, El Marco Jackson gets our overall game ball as well. Okay, what's next for KU?

Starting point is 00:22:33 So they're going to be off the rest of the week, and then they're back at it. Tuesday, it doesn't get any easier. In fact, probably gets harder. They're going to be taken on Yukon. Now, they do have the friendly confi. They're going to be a little more fans than the stands for Tuesday's game when they take on Yukon than there were in this final game. But that'll be a really fun one.

Starting point is 00:22:50 Well, Darren Peterson be back. I hope this doesn't happen. But like, if KU loses their first game with Darren Peterson back after like winning all these games, there's going to be people being, you know, who have some ridiculous. takes when it's probably just going to be like either Yukon played a really good game or like, hey, you have to adjust when you bring new players in there.

Starting point is 00:23:10 But ideally, you're able to pick up where you left off here and add Darren Peterson and just keep it soaring. And then the sky's the limit. Like I said, to end last segment for this team. But you have the Yukon game. Then you have the upcoming Missouri game on a neutral site at the D-Mobile center. You have the game coming up at NC States.

Starting point is 00:23:26 And this is a really difficult part of the non-con and the schedule for KU. But it'll be kind of like it is in Big 12. play and then it'll be a couple easier games from there and then on to big 12 play where you know you're trying to compete for a conference crown all that'll do for this episode of locked on jahawks so you can find our show anywhere you get your podcast including on our youtube page where you can like and subscribe to the show thank you so much for joining us on today's episode please check out the ku utop review and we'll be back for postcast with whatever happens over there see you next time on

Starting point is 00:23:52 loj

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - DAWGS: Kansas Jayhawks Comeback vs Tennessee as Elmarko Jackson & Melvin Council Power Epic WIN

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