Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Down West Virginia in Big 12 Quarterfinals Amidst Bill Self Health Scare

Episode Date: March 10, 2023

The Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball team downed the West Virginia Mountaineers 78-61 in the Big 12 Championship Quarterfinals at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, MO, accomplishing the victory over Bob Huggins with Norm Roberts filling in for Bill Self, who is dealing with a health related concern. The latest on Self, recap of KU vs WVU including GOATs of the game from Jalen Wilson to Gradey Dick, Dajuan Harris and more, and a quick preview of the Jayhawks battling the Iowa State Cyclones in the semifinals on Friday night.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!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.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Don’t miss the chance to get your No Sweat First Bet up to ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS in Bonus Bets when you go FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked on Jayhawks, the Bill Self news, KU wins a Big 12 quarterfinal, and now they move on to the Big 12 semifinals. Jam-packed show 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. Derek Johnson. You can hear me as well. Rock Chalk Sports Talk, Monday through Friday from 3 to 6 p.m. on KLWN in Lawrence.

Friday's edition of RCST is just going to be 3 to 4.30. That's because we have KU in the Big 12 semifinals against Iowa State with pregame starting at 4.30 on KLWN. Thanks for making Locked On Jayhawks, though, your first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get any of your podcasts. And on today's edition of Locked On Jayhawks, we're going to be going over

the Bill Self news. We're going to be going over a shorthanded Kansas, sort of. I mean, Kevin McCullough still played, but coming off the bench, finding a way to get through West Virginia and a very impressive win. Moving on to the Big 12 semifinals and then a little preview of KU Iowa State. So a loaded show here with Locked On Jayhawks. But first, this episode of the show is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook, official sportsbook of Locked On. Make every moment more. Visit FanDuel.com slash Locked On to get started today.

KU wins their Big 12 quarterfinal matchup with the West Virginia Mountaineers, but certainly the biggest storyline, the biggest news coming into the day was the health of Bill Self. So there were some, I would just say rumors, I guess, starting to swirl about this late Wednesday night. And then Thursday morning, I know there were a couple people who maybe jumped the gun a little bit on social media and were saying that it was like a heart attack or that it was maybe like a, I saw some people saying it was, I don't know, this or that, whatever.

Point is, it was not. And this is why you don't jump the gun on stuff like that. And also, probably not great that there were rumors swirling about it on Wednesday night and that you had people saying stuff because, so just to be clear, a lot of people don't know what HIPAA violations are. They think that you just can't disclose anything medical. No, if I just happened to be in the waiting room at KU Med and I saw Bill Self come through, I could talk about that. I could report on that. But if a doctor, if a

healthcare professional leaks information about it, that is a HIPAA violation. So I don't know if there was some HIPAA violations going on at KU Med. I'm sure they're going to be doing a lot of board review and stuff on how all that stuff got out. But nonetheless, KU basically released a report yesterday afternoon basically to quell away like that. No, it was not a heart attack. This is the exact release from KU because earlier in the day they released something saying he wasn't going to coach the Big 12 quarterfinal. People were wondering, obviously, that the number thing here was just, is Bill Self okay? The human part of it ahead of the sports part of it is, and it was, way more important. But here's the release that they sent. This was their kind of second release on it.

Kansas men's basketball coach Bill Self will not coach in the remainder of the Big 12 tournament. And here is the statement from University of Kansas Health System and Self. KU men's basketball coach, Coach Bill Self, is a patient at the University of Kansas Health System and South KU men's basketball coach. Coach Bill Self is a patient at the University of Kansas Health System. Chief medical officer Dr. Steve Stites wants to clarify that Coach Self did not suffer a heart attack, as reported by some media. He arrived at the emergency department last night and underwent a standard procedure that went well. He is expected to make a full recovery. There will be no further medical details released for now university of kansas health system uh coach

bill self said i am very grateful for the overwhelming number of well wishes my family and i have received i'm excited to get back with my team in the very near future now totally know the the process i've heard some things but i don't want to talk about that stuff because a, it's just, you know, it's health thing. It'd be like, I have no reason to jump the gun on stuff like this, but, uh, if some of the stuff that I've been hearing, like he should be okay, long-term and everything's okay. But again, I don't know everything for sure. So, uh, you just, you hope bill self is okay. You hope he's getting through all this uh situation and you wish the nurses well that are around when ku is playing their game but no and in all honesty like um you know the man is is above everything else here in terms of

him just getting healthy and okay and uh they'll they'll stick with norm roberts for the big 12 tournament at least we'll see how this impacts the NCAA tournament. But again, the health of an individual is more important than kind of the other stuff that's going on here. So Norm Roberts filling in. And man, I don't know what it is. The Big 12 tournament, to a certain standpoint, has just been a pit of sucky news for KU in recent years. You think about all the big man injuries. You think about, uh, the, the two COVID years, the one where nobody played and the NCAA tournament was canceled. The one where KU had to leave the tournament because they had COVID.

This is obviously the worst of all with all the news, but, um, yeah, man, big, big 12 tournament, not a good time for, for news. If it's KU related. That's certainly for sure. But sounds like, again, according to that release, everything is going to be okay with Bill Self, but it certainly changes things in the short term. The fact that they just said he won't coach the rest of the Big 12 tournament, but they didn't say anything about the NCAA tournament,

I don't know. I would imagine he's so competitive he's going to want to get back out there if he's cleared by the doctors but also uh with something like this you wonder if he would even be cleared at that point nonetheless i i think you know i i don't know i i'd be curious if that would it could affect their seating like if the tournament committee could say well we don't know if you're gonna have coach self so maybe you won't be the number one overall but i don't know that'd be kind of a crummy way to go about it i don't know uh nonetheless we're gonna get on to the game recap and then uh the look ahead to the iowa

state game here in just a second first don jay has brought to you about fanduel sportsbook the midway point of the nba season is here and now is the perfect time to download FanDuel, America's number one rated sportsbook app. New customers get a no sweat first bet up to $1,000. You heard me right. 1K. That's bonus bets back if your first bet does not win. Just download the FanDuel sportsbook app. It's safe, secure, and super easy to use. Then you can bet on everything from money line to point scores and threes drained. You can bet on the KU Iowa State line right now. It's KU minus four and a half, which seems like a big number to me.

You won the first game by just two or three. You lost the second game by a lot. I do expect KU to be way more energized than that second game. I think here's the play. If you think Kansas is going to win, you can get on FanDuel. Kansas by one to ten, because I think if if they do win it'll be a close game you have a lot of fans in attendance for both teams iowa state's a good team they make games close they obviously played kul so we think kansas is going to win take kansas by one to ten exactly and you get plus 168 i kind

of like that uh you can also check out some of their player props those haven't come out yet as of recording but they will be out before the game. Yesterday, I hit on Grady Dick over 13.5 points. That was fun. Feels like he's back again. So maybe pick your favorite player and player two and bet a couple of the stats because you can combine

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Kansas takes down West Virginia, I think 78-61, the final score for Kansas moving on through the Big 12 quarterfinals. I guess history on their side now. No NCAA tournament champion has lost their first game of a conference tournament. And since 2002, every national champion has made it to at least their conference tournament semis. So KU now continues on with that group of things.

That's always a positive it was kind of a ho-hum win for kansas and i say that in the best way possible because for kansas you come off a bad texas performance you come off two games before that where you played competition that you know the spreads the some of the metric sites have K you win in both games, somewhere between like seven to nine points and you win both on kind of last second possessions where it's like, okay, is this team not playing up to par right now? I think looking back, there is something to be said about maybe the,

the tech and West Virginia games were closer than you'd expect because a, those were both, you know, there were teams fighting tooth and nail to get to the ncaa tournament but b you had the pressure on your shoulders of trying to win the big 12 title right and maybe that mattered and then the texas game you didn't have the mentality and everything but um it was nice to to get back to this point where you felt like okay that that's what they look like when they're really good, right? You led for over 35 minutes of the game. You won by double figures. You just kind of were in control the whole way through.

The offense was electric for KU, but a lot of it, too, was led by the defense. The defense did a really good job getting opportunities for the offense to get out in transition. KU shot 52% for the game. They shot over 60% in the second half, executed really well, got open shots. It was nice to see Grady Dick be aggressive and searching for his shots. You really saw all the starters contribute scoring the ball. Joe didn't have an ultra-efficient efficient game but he still contributed with like seven points and for the most part it continues to be a thing where if four of the five starters

play well for kansas they're usually in really good shape and that was the case again last night um you won the possession game too west virginia came in number one in the big 12 in offensive rebound rate well you ended up with four more offensive rebounds than they had you all said two less turnovers and what makes the offensive rebound numbers even crazier is like you shot at a higher percentage than west virginia so um i guess you did have two less turnovers that's that's two possible less shots but you shot at a higher percentage so in theory there's less of your shots that are available than theirs. You led 16-2 in second chance points. You led 52-36

points in the paint. You were 13-10 in points off turnovers. Just across the board, it was a really impressive outing for KU. I don't know that it'll be a game that we look back on in five years and everybody remembers beating West Virginia 78-61. I guess it is possible because

you'll remember maybe more of the news around it with the Bill Self stuff but it was just a ho-hum win and that's that's nice to see and uh it was good to see Norm Roberts continue his undefeated streak at KU getting to 5-0 uh it just felt like KU would get up you know six or seven West Virginia would punch back they wouldn't let Kansas get away they'd keep it within a four to six point game but eventually in the second half KU had that kill shot that we're so used to seeing them have in the second half of games and expanded it too much and they were able to kind of coast to the finish line from there so just important to make you feel like you're playing well again and certainly they did in that game goats of the game let's start with the good jalen wilson 22 points he was 9 of 17 from the floor over 50 that'll play

one of his first games over 50 in a long time he had 11 rebounds too he also added two assists and i think he started one for six that would mean he finished eight for 11 that's been kind of a theme for him he's maybe started a little bit slow games, maybe had to feel things out, and then he really gets it going. And that was the case yesterday against West Virginia. He was really impressive. Grady Dick. It was nice to see him get back to a really positive way of playing.

18 points on seven of 12 from the floor, four of seven from three, three rebounds. But above all, it was the aggressiveness of his shots three three rebounds but above all it was the aggressiveness of his shots it wasn't just him getting wide open shots and taking them he did get you know a couple open shots and then took them and made them but there were a couple where it was like well it's you know it's not fully contested but it's a it's a semi-contested three like uh it's not a wide open look but it's it's not a super covered look either and that's been kind of a qualm that you're trying to work on with Grady Dick one is is the movement without the ball and off the ball to free

himself open the other is hey I know you're being a good teammate and you're trying to get somebody else an open shot but you shooting a semi-contested three is probably a better shot than a lot of guys on the team shooting a wide open three, right? He's just that good of a shooter. And the rest of KU, you know, outside of like DeJuan Harris, wide open three is not as good of a shooter, right? It's maybe an average, below average shooting team around him. So that was really nice to see the aggressiveness go up

and him kind of get out of his rut from the previous two games. We'll see if he can carry it over and have back-to-back games with the Iowa State game DeJuan Harris gets a good go 13 points eight assists four rebounds had a handful of steals he has double digits steals the last two games combined against West Virginia so he's really done a good job picking his pocket and he held Kedrian Johnson in check. Johnson went just three for nine for the game. That was after the game before. He had like 15 points.

Johnson was excellent in the first meeting, or not the first, the second meeting with West Virginia that was in Allen Fieldhouse. But Harris kind of just ate his lunch and was so good on really both ends of the court and doing everything for this team. He was really impressive in kind of an open game. K.J. Adams, I think it's a good go. 13 points. He was really good on the offensive end.

Had some nice and one plays or dunks. He had three rebounds, two assists. Not an overwhelmingly gigantic, like, statistic game there or anything, but I thought he played very well and had some good finishes around the basket. You heard from Eric Stevenson after the game from West Virginia and he basically complimented how difficult Kansas is to stop in the pick and roll because they have a guy like KJ Adams who really makes Kansas unique because it is a center who's able to roll to the rim finishing traffic it can dunk he said that you know he's tough to stop because he can put his

chin on the rim but he's also a good passer and he can hit that little pop shot from right inside the free throw line makes KU really dangerous in the pick and roll with with him and both DeJuan the last good goat I have here is Norm Roberts uh shout out to Norm man 4-0 in the suspension but this one was even tougher think about it like this KU announced the suspension to Bill Self and Curtis Townsend I don't remember how far it was from the start of the season but it might have been a week or two they had time to prep for it and Bill Self was still around the team with with some of the practices just not the day of for this it sounds like the team didn't learn about it till the morning of the game and this goes to the player leadership as well

but it's also norm roberts and the current coaching staff i mean you're talking about having to all of a sudden compartmentalize sort of and and realize and digest all that tough information and then go play a game a few hours later and that that's really difficult to do i think it helps having veteran leadership like a Jalen Wilson, like a DeJuan Harris, and having these guys that can help out. But having Norm Roberts at the bench to be that guiding presence when he took over early in the season is such a boon for KU to have that. I posted a clip on social media.

It was of Norm Roberts or, well, it was of Jalen Wilson in his senior day speech. And he mentioned Norm Roberts and, and how important he was to him and how he always would call out plays in the huddle of the other team. And that just shows you the coaching acumen and the preparation that Norm Roberts does. And he does a lot of the scouts and everything. So, you know, KU was going to be compared prepared and they certainly were, and they're in good hands with Norm Roberts. Certainly you want Bill Self to be back. You want him to be healthy and everything, but shout out to Norm who continues to do an excellent job when he has to fill in for Bill Self. All right, the Bad Goats. I can't really say the bench because Kevin came

off the bench, and I know Kevin only had three points. He was dealing with the back injury, though, and played good defense. He had like seven rebounds. So, you know, our earnest was solid off the bench. So you can't say the bench, I guess. I don't know.

Bobby Pettiford kind of empty calories in his quick minutes out there. I guess you could put that there. I guess you could put Joe Yesifu being a bit out of control. Like I think he had three turnovers. One of them was, I think Grady Dick's fault on a miscommunication, but it went to Joe. And overall overall like yes if it was a bit i don't know lucy goosey and he didn't play nearly as much as in the second half because of it but he still you know if you

got seven minutes a game from joe i think you kind of take that so i don't know i don't really have any bad goats here how about that how? How about that? Deal with it. All right. We're going to finish up with our preview real quick of the Iowa State game. But first, this episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by Bilt Bar. Are you looking for a delicious treat but don't want all of the fat and calories? Then you've got to try a Bilt Bar. If you're like me, you want to eat healthier and you're looking for snacks that, you know, aren't candy or a bag of chips or something, and you want to eat something that still tastes good. Built Bar's perfect.

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with hit flavors like Brownie Batter and Churro. You can take me later with Bill Parr. Kansas takes on Iowa State in the Big 12 semifinal round. The Cyclones beat the Brains in on Kansas the last time we saw the matchup between the two. That was in Ames. I think 68-53 was the final score. It was a game that Jalen Wilson played well, but basically nobody else for Kansas played well.

The game that was in Allen Fieldhouse saw Kansas win 62-60. Now, no Caleb Grill for Iowa State, who struggled in the first matchup that you played against him, and he missed the final shot for Iowa State. the second matchup grill had nine points he just went one of seven from three point range and in the second matchup it was uh I don't know Iowa State took advantage of Kansas switching everything and and they really hurt the the tagger so to speak the guy who's supposed to come over and get the guy rolling to the rim um KU has been switching up their defense a bit since then so I wonder how much that'll help them in this matchup. Plus, they should just be playing with more energy,

but in that last matchup, Jaron Holmes was really good. In both matchups, Osin Osinye has been really dominant inside for Iowa State, but yeah, I mean, Jalen Wilson had 26 for Kansas in the game in Ames. Nobody had more than eight points. And here's a little trivia for you. Who was second on the team with eight points? Ding, ding, ding. Joe Yesifu. Congratulations if you got it right. You get no prize, but you do earn my honor and respect.

So one and one in the two matchups. But you know what's funny? Coming into this Big 12 tournament, when we were previewing the path, I kind of said, I think you'd almost rather play Iowa State than Baylor just because of the danger of those Baylor guards getting hot. But now that you're there, now that you're playing Iowa State, you're like, oh, man, they're going to have a good crowd in attendance. KU will have a good crowd as well.

But now it's not going to be like an overwhelming KU crowd. It might be like a 50-50 split or 60-30,30 60-40 whatever um Iowa State did play KU well so the biggest keys for this one you gotta defend Gabe Kalsher well and the biggest challenge for that could be that Kevin McCuller if he's still limited with the back or he can't you know play as well then that's going to be a problem in trying to defend him so it almost has to be a group and a team effort, because I'd imagine DeJuan Harris will be on Lipsy. But then again, Lipsy has been someone that teams have sagged off and not really played him super tight. I wonder if you would put DeJuan Harris on Gabe Kalsher and you'd almost put like Grady Dick on Tamir Lipsy and just have him kind of hang back and he can be kind of a help defender in the middle. I don't know if that would be the case or how KU will work it, if they're going to keep switching, if they're going to play straight up man to man, or at least on a few guys, it'll certainly be very interesting.

When you look at Iowa State, this is the number seven offense in the Big 12. They've really cooled off from where they were at the beginning of the year, but they're a really good offensive rebound team. So you have to be good on the defensive glass again. They're good at shooting threes. A lot of that is Gabe Kalsher. And then they're the number one defense in Big 12 only play. So a lot of your open looks that you had against West Virginia, they're not going to be there. But the number one thing you have to do in this game,

Iowa State is number one in the conference. They are number one in both steal rate defensively and turnover rate defensively. They are also number two in the entire country in turnover rate defensively and turnover rate defensively they are also number two in the entire country in turnover rate defensively have to take care of the basketball that means dewan harris have yourself a game uh so that's kind of what i'm looking for in this one and then how ku defends the post with osani but obviously no bill self for this game uh it could be a tight game you expect it to be a tight game You expect it to be a tight game.

You expect it to be a close game. So you don't have that advantage maybe of Bill Self with out-of-timeout plays and those little adjustments throughout a game. How does that affect things here? We saw Norm Roberts win a close game against Duke, and he was able to pass that test there. This will certainly be a tougher test than yesterday for Roberts. All right, that'll do it for this episode of

Locked on Jayhawks. Pretty jam-packed with information. We will try to get you an episode for tomorrow to recap whatever happens in the semifinals. Locked and loaded here with another edition. You can hear me as well on Rock Truck Sports Talk later today from 3 to 4.30. You can give me a follow on Twitter at

DJohnsonRadio. You can find our show wherever you get your podcasts with Locked on Jayhawks, and you can give me a follow on Twitter at D Johnson radio you can find our show wherever you get your podcast with locked on Jayhawks and you can also hit us up on YouTube have a good rest of your day later