Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - DOMINANCE: Kansas Rolls Davidson as Kohl Rosario and Jayden Dawson DELIVER for Jayhawks

Starting point is 00:00:00 Six Jayhawks and double figures. This is about as good of a regular season finale as you could ask for, Kansas dominates Davidson. You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Hey, Derek Johnson here with Locked on Jayhawks. Thanks for making it your first listen every day. and thank you for making the Locked-on Podcast Network of the number one sports podcast network on today's episode of the show

Starting point is 00:00:35 looking down in Kansas dominating Davids in 90 to 61 in what was KU's one of their most efficient games of the season and a really, really strong finish to the regular season non-conference portion of the year for KU, even without Darren Peterson, six players and double figures, Colrosario, we saw some life from him and Jana Dawson,

Starting point is 00:00:55 two of our storylines coming to the game, we'll get all that, as well as game awards, What's next for Kansas, all that and more on today's episode of the show, which is brought to you by Game Time. With Game Time, you can download the app, create account, use code Locked-on College for $20 off your first purchase. So Kansas takes down Davidson 90 to 61. It was a really impressive outing. And yes, Davidson is not one of the better teams that Kansas is going to play this year, but it's still a team that could potentially compete in the A-10 or, you know, make some noise there. and Kansas just rolled through them rather easily 90 to 61 here,

Starting point is 00:01:33 even doing it without your best player in Darren Peterson, six different Jayhawks were in double figures. And this was kind of exactly what the doctor ordered. When you look at what Kansas needed to get out of this game, obviously a win was number one and a blowout win was obviously nice to see as well. And the way that Kansas did it doing so many things well, you know, passing the ball defensively, defending inside the arc, forcing turnovers, they did a lot of things well in this game.

Starting point is 00:02:01 But coming into this, one of the big things we talked about for a preview was what would they do with the potential extra minutes, whether it was the extra minutes of winning and a blowout or the extra minutes of Darren Peterson not being there. And you got both this game for players like Cole Rosario and Jaden Dawson. Because both those players right now have kind of become fringe rotation players for KU. And they needed to take care of this opportunity to give themselves their best chance to be a part of that rotation. And for the best for KU, the best version of this Kansas Jayhawks team is at least one of those guys, if not both, with Rosario and Dawson, being real players on this team, being guys who can come in and make a three-pointer, being guys who can give you legit minutes because this team needs that. And when they're playing well, it just raises this team to a whole other level. And both of those guys did that in this specific game.

Starting point is 00:02:59 And to me, that is one of the biggest positives here. Like, obviously with Cole Rosario, 13 points, he hits three, three-pointers. But it was almost like the, I don't know, just the recklessness in a way of the threes he was taking. Because the big thing with Rosario, like we knew his profile coming in was that he was supposed to be one of the best shooters. on the team. And he had a decent start shooting the three ball that began the season. And then it kind of hit a, well, it was a little shaky start. And then it was good for a little bit there. And then it hit another lull. And it seemed like a lot of it was confidence-based. If you watch the game today with Colorsari, you would never walk away from a game thinking that he was, you know,

Starting point is 00:03:43 that there was a confidence thing. Because the three that he took in transition, some of the contested threes, one of the fading threes he had in the corner. Some of them he made some of the him he didn't but it's the confidence and the process of believing that you can make those shots and that is why you're here at Kansas that is why you're playing as a freshman yeah there's other things you're good at too but like that is what is going to carry the day and so for him to show that confidence i'm hoping that it unlocks that new skill and was a big day for him jane and dawson the stats don't jump out as much as rosario two points two rebounds to assist but i thought he actually played a really good game like i thought the big difference between dawson and rosario is rosario

Starting point is 00:04:21 got, you know, more shots off and was able to make them more often. But, like, I thought Dawson was impressive on both ends of the floor. I thought he was good on the defensive end. He was making some good passes. So even though it's not as big of a blow-up performance shooting the ball, I actually thought he played really well, too. And that is one of the biggest takeaways from this one is that you did have that performance from both guys when you don't know if you're going to, you know,

Starting point is 00:04:43 are you going to beat another team by 30 the rest of the way with how difficult the big 12 is? It's definitely possible. You have the right game and maybe it happens once or twice, but you can't bank on it. And so using this opportunity, I think it was well used for both of those guys. I think beyond that, like one of the other biggest positives of this one for KU is just how well they turned Davidson over. I mean, he had 13 steals in this game. It was KU's best defensive turnover rate of the season.

Starting point is 00:05:11 So it was the best turnover forcing game of the season. And we've talked about all year long that like, okay, you're an athletic team with a lot a wingspan with switchable pieces. I don't know why that shouldn't lead to being a good team at forcing Tartovers. And we'll see if this is the aberration or if this is something they can kind of build on, but that would be certainly helpful to them, you know, even playing faster and getting out in transition like they were able to do

Starting point is 00:05:32 in this specific game. But I think in general, like, it's pretty much all positives in this game, right? I mean, you walk away. I guess the one negative you could point to is you would just say, okay, Darren Pee can play again for Kansas. And I mean, that's not great that he still remains injured and stuff, but also when he missed the last game, it almost felt like to me he was just going to miss this one too. And as much as we keep hearing about, okay, like, is it cramping?

Starting point is 00:06:01 Is he practicing? Is he not? Like, who knows? But even though it's a negative that he's not playing, and obviously from a long-term perspective, that's a negative. But like from a short-term perspective, it actually worked out okay in this game that he didn't play. Because him not playing allowed some of these guys to get extra minutes. It allowed Jamarie McDowell to play, you know, 23 minutes and not that necessarily he's in danger,

Starting point is 00:06:27 but I thought he played well as well, but allowed Jaden Dawson to play 17 minutes. It allowed Col Rosario to play 19 minutes. If Peterson plays, maybe Dawson's at 8, 9, 10 minutes, right? Maybe Rosario is at 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 minutes. And maybe they don't get the opportunity to, you know, perform like they did in this game. So you want to get Peterson back. It's obvious. You hope you have them back for the start of the Big 12 play. No idea what's going to happen there. And that is the negative of this one, that it is still a question mark.

Starting point is 00:06:56 You don't know what's going on. But at the very least, you can make the argument and say that, well, for this specific game, in a vacuum, this specific matchup, it maybe helped KU develop some of their guys a little bit more with the opportunity. So I think the bottom line is this. just in general, this would have been an easy letdown spot for Kansas. It's a Davidson team that shoots the ball really well. And they actually shot the ball well from three in this game where they shoot 36%.

Starting point is 00:07:24 They shoot well from three. It's a team that gets it done sometimes on execution. They don't have anybody averaging more than a dozen points per game. And you can get beat on cuts and off ball and stuff. And this is your last game before Christmas break. And a lot of the kids are going to be, I'd imagine everyone, but going to be going back home to your family to spend Christmas to your family. You're looking forward to that. You're looking forward to traveling.

Starting point is 00:07:50 Obviously, school's not in session right now. You're overlooking. It'd be very easy to overlook this game. And all of a sudden, it's a six point game at the under eight timeout, similar to that Harvard game a couple of years ago. But you never really had that. You just had your foot on the gas pedal from the word go. And maybe just as impressively, even with the big lead, you had a half time, you should. still added to it in the second half.

Starting point is 00:08:14 And I think just in general, when you look at how this team in the non-conference performed this year against teams who are kind of in that Davidson vein where like, okay, Davidson came into this one, 125th on Ken Palm, like, that would be kind of the type of team you would be playing in a 314 matchup potentially, you know, it just depends how everything shakes out. But like, you look at that game, you look at Towson, who's 132nd on Ken Palm. Again, that's kind of like your 314, 215 matchup, potentially. potentially 413, depending on how good the mid-majors are that year.

Starting point is 00:08:46 But whether it's that one, or whether it's going back to the Princeton game, or the Texas A&M Corpus Christi or the Green Bay game, you've slaughtered these mid-major schools. And, yes, it's more important you do it in the big games. But, like, who knows, if you get a good enough seed in the NCAA tournament where you are playing one of these teams in the first round, that's good that, like, you've performed well in these games to make you think that you should be able to avoid.

Starting point is 00:09:12 that first round scare as long as you can get to that point let's get to our moments plays stat of the game awards all that and more this is locked on jahawks today's episode of the show is brought to you by game time there's nothing like college football season which is kind of coming to a close year but it's still bowl season which is still super fun I know they're trying to take away the bowls from us but you can still go and have a good time and plus it's college basketball season too you might be thinking hey where do we get tickets to all these events well Go to game time because with game time, not only are they taking the surprises away from tickets. I mean, you can literally see the seat view of what tickets you want to get.

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Starting point is 00:10:27 Create an account and use code locked on college for $20 off for first purchase. Terms apply. Again, that's code Locked on College, L-O-C-E-O-N-C-L-E-G-E for $20 off. Download the GameTime app today. game time. Thanks again for joining us here on Lockdown Jayhawks, making us your first listen every day and making Lockdown the number one sports podcast network. If you haven't already, go check out our new Everydayer Club.

Starting point is 00:10:53 You can get access to add free audio for Locked on Jayhawks with Apple Podcasts, Spotify and every other major podcast app and an invite to the members only locked on every day or club Discord server, which includes a group chat just for listeners of this show. So you can check that out over in our link at locked on podcast.com slash every day or we're going to have that link in our show notes. Okay, moments and plays of the game for KU's 90 to 61 victory over Davidson. The early moment of that game where Melvin Council has that kind of, he's like driving or he's pulling the ball out. He's dribbling out to the three point line. And then he makes the guy think that, okay, I'm just going to like, you know, stroll in the park to the three point.

Starting point is 00:11:35 And then all of a sudden he turns and cuts the other way. and gets the reverse layup the other way. You know he likes to play one-on-one. We've seen some of those post-game videos. That's a move he's using one-on-one 100%. But that was cool to see. The Rosario, I mean, KU had a bunch of alley-ups in general. The Rosario one that made it 38 to 25, which the reason I stood that one out, again,

Starting point is 00:11:58 Rosario had a couple of them. Flory had it, right? There was a drive by counsel, and he's got two options. He could have thrown the alley-oop. It was to make it 3825 to Florey at the left or Rosario at the right. He had two options. He went to Rosario there. I think just in general, one of the moments of the game had to be Trey White's first half.

Starting point is 00:12:18 I mean, Trey White finishes with 18 points in this game. If this was like, I guess, a close game and I don't know, like, Trey White had to like keep his foot on the gas pedal in the second half. Like he could have easily scored 30 in this game. He was feeling it in the first. to have to say the least. I think the one move where Melvin counsel showed like he took like two or three steps at full speed showed how fast he was. And then he does this kind of like hybrid of like a Euro step and a sham god into a layup to make it 51 to 27. That was just a really cool play in general.

Starting point is 00:12:54 Melvin counsel honestly like no, he was in his bag in this game for sure. I don't know that Bill Self loved the shot on the second straight three. Rosario hits the corner three. I mentioned this earlier. But the fact that you had the confidence next time down in transition where it's a one-on-one the defenders in front of him and he just pulls up and sticks the three in the guy's face. Again, I don't know that that's one that Bill Self would love all the time, but in that specific moment and showing what the confidence level is for Rosario, which is where they need it to be, I loved it. Even if you would have missed it, they need that confident version of Rosario. And then I would also say, if we're talking about we're doing well, the stretch where Dossi,

Starting point is 00:13:35 has back-to-back assists, really good entry pass into Florey, who does a good job of just kind of catching and immediately going up all in one motion. And then Dawson jumps the passing lane, gets a steal, and lobs it kind of backwards over his head to Flory for a transition hoop. And then the last one here, the no look pass from Tiller, who was doubled on the block to Smeese Calderon for the dunk. Some cool plays all around for KU. Our stats of the game, or stat of the game, for you figure here for KU.

Starting point is 00:14:04 So Davidson shot 37% from three. They shot 36% from the field. So that means they shot below. They were at 13 of 37 on two-point shots. The fact that you held them that on twos is really impressive. Even though they have a good shooting game from three, they were never in the game. You shooting 58% to their 36% with the dominance on twos. That's impressive.

Starting point is 00:14:26 This is also KU's best three-point shooting game of the season by percentage, 11 of 21. So that certainly sticks out for KU. interestingly, 11 total free throws in this game. I mean, both teams took a lot of jump shots, which, by the way, quick award for that one, the fastest game ever. I'm not complaining. It's the best thing ever, right? How fast the game was.

Starting point is 00:14:44 My only complaint would be, why can't one of those fast games happen when they play at 8 o'clock? But anyway, now I'm sounding very, very old. Okay. But the 27 to 21 points off turnovers, that doesn't sound like it was that big of an advantage. At one point in the game, I want to say it was like 23 to 10 or something. And I think some of that got balloon or got a little tightened as the game continued on and KU starts throwing in different players at the end of the game.

Starting point is 00:15:08 So I don't know. That one doesn't end up being a stat of the game, but like I thought for the meaningful parts of the games, it did. I should also mention this. KU had 34 defensive remounts. Davidson had 12 offensive remounts, much better defensive rebounding game for KU than the previous game. And then the points on the page, 48 to 24, doubling them up there. Fast break points was 11 to 4. all of those stick out. But our stat of the game is this, 27 assists for KU compared to 15

Starting point is 00:15:36 for Davidson. The 15 for Davidson is actually a decent fine number. But the 27 assists for KU is very, very impressive. And they were doing it with a little bit of everyone. Like, I mean, Melvin Council had nine of them. So he was the main culprit and was not that far away from a triple double, but like it was a little bit of everyone. Trey White had one. Jamar McDowell had four. Bryson Tiller had that no look one. Floyd Budunga had three. Jaden Dawson had those two that we talked about earlier. Calderon had one on the dunk by Paul M. Bia. Five for a Marco Jackson off the bench who felt played well.

Starting point is 00:16:07 Justin Cross even had one in late game situation. So the 27 assists, Sharon the Rock and the way they played so fast, I thought that was our stat of the game. Our other awards of the game, the roller coaster award is going to go to Bryson Tiller. I thought overall, I really like Bryson Tiller's game today, but I think you saw some freshman moments. So, like, there were some plays where it was like, oh, my gosh, Bryson Tiller's so good. Like the no look pass again, right? There were, I don't know, like a dunk here there or tipping out an offensive rebound. There were some plays by Bryson Tiller that was like, man, that was really good.

Starting point is 00:16:44 And then there were some other players where it was like, okay, that was a bad turnover or, you know, why didn't you rotate to this guy and give up a dunk or whatever? And it's just like, okay, you can see the roller coaster of the young player. But overall, good game for Bryson Tiller. and I like that he's going for it to play off back to games. And then our final award here is Bill Self's favorite play. What do we think Bill Self's favorite play is? I chalked down four options. There's probably others we could go to, but I didn't want to overdo it here.

Starting point is 00:17:11 So there was a moment in the second half where Davidson, oh gosh, was it in the second half? Maybe it was the first half. No, I think it was the second half. Actually now, whatever, I think it was actually the first half now. Jamarie McDowell like on a rebound loose ball I don't even remember now he just like rips the ball away it looked like it was going to be a jump ball with him in the Davidson player and he just like fought for it and ripped it away I'd imagine Bill Self loved that one another one there was the Melvin council where he like tips the ball on the pass and then chase it down

Starting point is 00:17:40 with the guy chasing him uses speed gets there earns a foul um there was the one play where now it was set up by Tiller kind of lost the ball to begin with but then he sprinted back to get the loose ball in the corner and he collided he got to get sandwiched by two davidson players took a hard fall but really fought for the the effort play for k u and then uh the last one i had here was tiller tipping out an offensive rebound that eventually led to a cole rissario three um i think he would have liked all of those let's go with the jemari mcdowell though ripping the ball away on the potential jump ball winning them one of those 50 50 balls all let's get about some uh offensive defensive and overall game balls and what is next on the

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Starting point is 00:19:20 you. Thanks for joining us here on Lockdown Jayhawks, making us your first listen every day. Don't forget you can check out Lockdown College Basketball for your second listen every day as well. And also we had an episode just come out talking about Jordan Peterson, former KU assistant, who now the defensive coordinator at Kansas State and the impact of that. We also did an episode talking about Tyree Walker, who reportedly has been reached out to by Kansas, coordinated to Pius Bass of the athletic, and could KU make a mid-season edition? So check out all those episodes along with others here on Locked on Jayhawks. All right, our game balls for this one, KU winning 90 to 61.

Starting point is 00:20:00 Let's start with the offensive game ball for KU. This is going to be tough because six Jayhawks end up in double figures for the game. 18 from White, 10 each from McDowell and counsel, 11 from Tiller, 18 from Floory, 13 from Col Rosario. Then you look at the offensive rebounds. You also get one from Trey White. You get one from counsel. You get two from Tiller.

Starting point is 00:20:20 I'm just reading stats, so I don't want to keep doing it like this. But anyway, point being, you also get the nine assists from Melvin Council. I don't really know who to pick. I guess, I mean, Rosario, that was really important. What he did, Flory is still kind of a hub of the offense, and he did a little of everything. Offensive rebound, three assists, 18 points. I'm tempted to go Melvin Council because 10 points on 4 of 6 with nine assists to one turnover is really, really impressive. He'll have the team plus minus at 40.

Starting point is 00:20:49 But I'm going to go Trey White because when the game was, I guess, a little more at hand in the first half when it's not as much of a blowout and there's still plenty of time left. And Davidson did at one point, you know, go on that little run and I cut it down to what was it like 36, 25. Trey White was the one who pulled it away for KU. He had that unbelievable stretch where he's hitting threes. He's driving. He finishes with 18 points for the game. He had an offensive rebound. he had an assist as well also had four steals so tray white will be our offensive game ball in a game that you could pick a lot of different people uh defensive game ball for k u four steals for tray white puts him up there melvin council had two and a block tiller had two and two blocks florrie had two steals in a block i'm going to give it to jaden dawson i mean getting two steals in a block in 17 minutes is really impressive but i noticed him at other times where i was kind of like keen on him kind of watching him where he was doing a really good job like staying and

Starting point is 00:21:45 front of his offensive player at other times, too. So I'm going to actually give it to Jaden Dawson. And then our overall game ball, let's give that one to Melvin Council. Again, 10 points, nine assists, seven rebounds, just one turnover, two steals, one block, filled up the stat sheet, best plus minus on the team was the driving force for KU. He was really impressive. And yeah, man, Melvin Council continues to be a fan favorite. And what an addition for K, I mean, if we're talking about best transfer portal additions that Bill Self has ever, had obviously you got some really good ones up there right i mean just recently kevin mcculler was a good one just from a production perspective hunter dickinson was there the winning obviously wasn't quite up to snuff

Starting point is 00:22:26 of what you'd hoped but production wise it was certainly up there um you think of jeff withy and what he did over kind of a long period of time there's other ones that go up there um but i'm trying i'm having a hard time thinking of one that that was more like under heralded or less heralded than this one from a national perspective. Because, like, McCuller was still like, like people from a national perspective, you knew McCuller was like this really good defender who could be like an all-big 12 player, you know?

Starting point is 00:22:55 With Withy, sure, that one took a little more projection, but he had more time. And that was just the day and age that that was in college basketball. Like, you look through some of these, like Hunter, everybody knew he was an All-American before he came to Kansas. People didn't really know what KU was going to get with Melvin Council. And with how good as he has been, what a pleasant surprise for KU.

Starting point is 00:23:15 All right, what is next for the Jayhawks? So they open up Big 12 play. They've got some time off here, which this first part will be time off with their family, time to rest, which hopefully that leads to recovery for Darren Peterson. And then they'll get back and have some extra practice time. And then they'll get ready to go play UCF on the road. We've seen some close games or lot that we saw I'm losing Orlando a couple years ago. So that'll open up Big 12 play for KU.

Starting point is 00:23:41 Then they will be back home on Tuesday, January 6th against TCU for the Big 12th. home opener. And then West Virginia, which is always a tough place to play. And West Virginia, I can shoot it a little bit with some guys. And then it's a big one at home against Iowa State, which I think obviously you'd hope you have Darren Peterson back for that one against one of the best teams in the country. Obviously, you're hoping he's back for the start of Big 12 play. But that is the first four for KU. We're going to have some content talking about the toughest games in the schedule for KU and Big 12. What's kind of the roadmap to what they need to do to accomplish certain goals in the Big 12 and plenty more coming up on

Starting point is 00:24:20 the show. All right, that'll do it for this episode of Lockdown Jayhawks. You can find our show anywhere you get your podcast, including on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. I'll see you next time for another edition of LOJ.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - DOMINANCE: Kansas Rolls Davidson as Kohl Rosario and Jayden Dawson DELIVER for Jayhawks

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