Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Locked On Jayhawks - 11.19.19

Episode Date: November 19, 2019

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What's up Jayhawk Nation? Welcome into another game day edition of Locked On Jayhawks. We love this time of year. The fourth ranked now Kansas Jayhawks who hopped Kentucky who fell all the way down to nine will be back in action tonight against a very good mid-major in East Tennessee State. I am Sean Kellerman, Learfield IMG College broadcaster and University of Kansas insider. This is Locked On Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, bringing you insight, numbers, and a chance to hear from all the voices within Kansas athletics. Like I try to do every game day, I want to make sure that all our listeners get to hear from Bill Self and KU players. We're going to have a lot of sound for you today, talking nothing but KU hoops on this Tuesday. We're going to hear from Bill Self, Christian Brown, and Silvio De Sosa, who were made available to the media yesterday in advance of tonight's game. A 7 p.m. tip at Allen Fieldhouse.

It's officially the first game of the Maui Gym Maui Invitational, but of course taking place here. I'm not really sure the thinking behind that, but it seems like there's always in these early season tournaments a game on campus before there's the games to take place, of course, in the actual bracket, which we'll get into as the week goes on with the Maui Gym Maui Invitational starting on Monday. Kansas will be taking on the host team Chaminade at eight o'clock on Monday. First things first, it's KU and East Tennessee State tonight. Yesterday we talked about the Monmouth win on Friday. Just complete domination on a part of the Jayhawks as Kansas shot 56% from the field compared to Monmouth just 30%. KU hit 14 threes. That's been really a bright spot this season, the percentage

so far for the Jayhawks, and they did it behind Isaiah Moss, and we'll hear Bill Self's thoughts on Isaiah, who's hopefully inching his way closer to 100 percent. KU 14 to 30, 46 percent from beyond the arc. They got two out of four at the free throw line from Yudoka Azubuki, contributing to their 77 percent performance at the line. 24 of 31. Mention Moss. He led all scores with 21 points. Moss hit his first four threes and ended up 5 of 6 in just 15 minutes.

All six of his attempts coming from beyond the arc. And Christian Brown, another guy we'll hear from. 17 minutes. Brown had 11 points and did not miss a shot. 4 for 4 from the field. 3 for 3 from beyond the arc. David McCormick, an incredibly impressive performance in terms of efficiency off the bench as well. McCormick in 16 minutes had 17 points, 11 boards, 4 assists, and no turnovers. Just really unbelievably impressive numbers for David who maybe has a little bit of a chip on his shoulder

now that Silvio was entered back into the starting lineup on Friday. Speaking of Silvio, he had 11 points and 6 boards in that game. Yudoka Azubuki had 12 points, 8 boards, and 3 blocks. And Devon Dotson rounded out the double-digit scores with 17 points on 7 of 9 from the free-throw line, 4 assists, and 4 steals for Dot. Complete dominance on the part of the Jayhawks. They scored 59 points in the first half.

It was 59-21, so Kansas didn't need to score at all in the second half. They still would have outscored the Hawks, who put up just 57. All right, Isaiah Moss, really an interesting guy coming in this year because he's a senior grad transfer. Kansas hasn't had many. Tarek Black had a good season here in his one year as he came over from Memphis about five or six years ago. But Moss was literally brought in for one reason,

because of his ability to shoot the ball. So when he makes it from the perimeter, everybody goes crazy in Allen Fieldhouse, and he was doing a lot of that on Friday. Moss with the 21 points. Bill Self after the game talked about how Isaiah was on fire. He's a good shooter. You know, we said that all along. He got like six really good looks, and, you know, that's not going to happen in a lot of games.

But it's good to have him out there because you can run bad offense and come away with three points. And, you know, certainly we shot it good as a team tonight. But it's good to have him out there because you can run bad offense and come away with three points. And certainly we shot it good as a team tonight. But, yeah, nobody shot it near like him. He was terrific. Asked in more general terms, Coach Self talked about how Moss can improve this offense. Well, I think that he can stretch the defense to allow big guys to have more space inside.

So, yeah, he's important. He's important. And I do believe, although we've been pretty effective against the zone so far in the few possessions that teams have zoned us, but I know that we're going to see a lot more of that moving forward. A zone can kind of be a pest, and you don't see a ton of high-level major conference teams playing it. Syracuse, Baylor, Washington, some teams that come to my mind.

But if you have a guy who can stroke it from outside, which so many teams do, if you have at least one or two of those guys, then that can break a zone and put that team back into man-to-man really quickly. And that is what Isaiah can do. Hopefully moving forward, he can shoot it consistently enough to where Kansas can feel like they can attack both the zone and the man. Other guy who had a phenomenal night was Christian Brown. We're not talking about him too much because he only played 11 minutes in this game,

but 11 points and 4 of 4 from the field, making all three of his threes. Now, Brown is definitely a different player than KU's Marcus Garrett, who's a junior. Brown, more of a natural shooter, but he's been compared to Marcus many times in terms of their toughness and their willingness to do whatever the team needs. Here's Christian yesterday talking about that comparison. I don't know if you've watched, but my defense really needs some improvements if I'm being compared to him. But it's an awesome comparison just because you guys watched Marcus for, what, three years now.

He's a really talented player. He plays really hard. He knows a lot about the game. So obviously he's probably the best defender in the Big 12. So in that aspect, I need to improve my defense, obviously. But I think I've said this before. I think our mentality when it comes to the game in basketball is just playing hard and being tough.

That's why we're most similar. CB was then asked, what is it about Marcus that makes him such a good player? Super tough all the time. Everything he does, he plays super hard, gets his hand on a lot of balls, gets deflections. And it's really impressive what he does on the defensive end because it's really infectious and it translates to the offensive end. And everything he does is downhill. And like I said, he's super tough.

That's Christian Brown talking about Zero. Marcus Garrett, who has been a staple of this KU team the past couple of years now. And Marcus has displayed the early stages, three regular season games and a couple exhibition games, better shooter. It just seems like the ball is coming out of his hand better. And aside from that, of course, reigning defensive Big 12 player of the year, does a little bit of everything. He and Ochai Abadji and Devon Dotson, as we've talked about,

we've heard the coaches and some of the guys talk about, have the potential to make this team elite defensively, particularly if you have Yudoka Azubuki protecting the rim. And we saw a little bit of everything against Monmouth in a game in which the stat sheet was completely stacked. I mentioned Doak had three blocks, Dot had four steals, and Ochai had three steals. Christian Brown actually chipped in with a pair of steals as well. So a lot of talent on this KU team, and that was a clear and utter dominance. One type of game maybe that we were used to seeing in the Roy Williams era in terms of number of points this team put up with 112. It had been a while for Kansas to get up that high,

but they've got guys, and they all performed pretty well on Friday. And now it's about parlaying that into the game tonight against a much tougher foe in East Tennessee State. We'll preview them in the last segment. Next segment, though, we're going to hear from Silvio De Sosa. He's going to talk about his slow start and why his coach thought that he deserved the start in the last game over David McCormick, who had started the first two regular season games.

We're also going to recap Big 12 games that happened last night, take a look at other games in action tonight in the Top 25, and later in the show, we'll hear Jayhawks in the NBA recap from last night as well. This is the Locked On Podcast Network, the local experts on the biggest stories. Big 12 Outlook from Monday night three games in action Oklahoma slipped past William and Mary in a close one 75-70, Christian Doolittle led the way for OU with 19 points, but it took him 21 shots to get there just 7 of 21, Doolittle led the way for OU with 19 points, but it took him 21 shots to get there, just 7 of 21.

Doolittle also chipped in 8 rebounds. The Shocker transfer, Austin Reeves, had nearly a double-double. He had 18 points and 9 boards. Brady Manick, the only other Sooner, in double figures with 10 as OU survives an upset, defeating William & Mary by 5. Another close one, West Virginia survives at home against Northern Colorado. Mountaineers improved to 3-0 on the year. For West Virginia, they were led by Jermaine Haley's 18 points and 12 rebounds.

Big man Derek Culver had 13 points and 5 boards in just 11 minutes. And a perfect 3-0 night for the Big 12 is rounded out by TCU upending Air Force in Fort Worth. That game 65-54 in favor of the Horned Frogs. And for TCU, Kevin Samuel, their big man, led the way with 19 points. Interestingly enough, Desmond Bain only had 7, but 3 in double figures in all for TCU. They also improved to 3-0 on the season. Tonight's game, in addition to our Jayhawks taking on East Tennessee State, Iowa State will host Southern Miss in an on-campus battle for Atlantis game,

and Kansas State will be hosting Arkansas Pine Bluff, both of those games tipping off at the same 7 o'clock tip time as our Jayhawks. And there's your Big 12 outlook, and now we turn our attention back to the Jayhawks as it's game night. KU East Tennessee State tonight at 7 o'clock. Jayhawks coming off that 112-57 win over Monmouth that took place at Allen Fieldhouse on Friday. We heard from Bill Suff regarding Isaiah Moss, who was a leading scorer in that game. Also heard from Christian Brown in the first segment about how he mirrors his game to Marcus Garrett

and how good and tough a player Marcus is. Another guy who we know is tough through everything he's been through is Silvio De Sosa. Silvio, of course, was not eligible the first half or so of his freshman season. So he came in, played as a freshman about 20 games, did not play last year as a technically a sophomore, of course, with all the NCAA stuff that was going on so this year you know one of the most loved Jayhawks of all time because of everything he's been through it was kind of expected that he would be the starting four man and Yudoka Azubuki would be the five guy in case you would get back to that two big look and at times that's been the case but of course as we've documented there have been a lot of situations where Bill Self has opted for

the four guard look because you're facing smaller, you're facing teams that go with four guards or at least four guys who can stretch it. And it's been a struggle thus far for both DeSosa and other four-man potential candidate David McCormick to get out and guard the perimeter. So, right now, we're kind of in flux. Like, where are we going to go in terms of Silvio and David? Of course, it wasn't a problem no matter who you put out there against Monmouth because of the talent differential and size differential. But De Sosa is kind of having a similar start to how he did his freshman year, which is understandable, coming in a little rusty after having not played for a while.

Here's Silvio comparing this slow start this year to that of his freshman year. I feel like I'm having the same start, which I shouldn't. for a while. Here's Silvio comparing this slow start this year to that of his freshman year. I feel like I'm having the same start, which I shouldn't, but you know, I'm just here to control what I can control, and whatever I can take care of, I'm doing. We know Silvio has the basketball ability to get things going, and we also know that he's very athletic, perhaps one of the more athletic guys on the team. Here's Christian Brown talking about that. He was probably right behind Ochai, the most athletic player on our team, with just explosiveness and other things like that. We see it every day. We're just waiting to see it in the game.

Once it happens, once it clicks for him, it'll really take off. Bill Self said after the game that Silvio deserved to start. Remember, David McCormick had started the first two games of the regular season after Silvio went the first two exhibition. But Self going with Silvio De Sosa in the game against Monmouth, and we'll see if that goes on to be the case moving forward. Self said he deserved it. Here's Silvio chiming in on why coach would have thought that.

I think he said it because for the past few practice we I have been doing a lot of better you know I think now I have figured out what I need to do on defense to help the team so that's probably why he said that. How exactly has Silvio improved in a press coach self in practice? Hard guard the four man, hard guard like I say see like everything and screen and stuff on defense. Since I'm the big guy, I have to see what's going on in front. So that's one of the things I have been doing a lot better. That's really been the sticking point all year with Kansas

continuing to go with the two bigs and be able to establish the dominance they could potentially have on the interior or on the offensive end. But there's the question mark of offensively can they play high low or is it going to be too crowded in there with Doak who doesn't move very far from the basket and Silvio and David guys who are kind of pounders as big guys as well they've improved their game both of them you can tell they've improved their jump shots but that is a factor it's not quite like Perry Ellis or Marcus Morris some guys are a little bit more comfortable

with the jump shot a little more comfortable away from the basket and then of course defensively all about can you guard that foreman out on the perimeter of the opposing team here's bill south talking about silvio's performance after monmouth i thought he did fine i i'll be honest david was our best big though so so uh uh but i i thought that that sylvia and dope both did fine but but uh i was more impressed with david than any of our bigs after the last game yeah it's hard to argue with david mccormick being the best big in the game of course you saw good things from all the bigs and limited minutes really dope played 23 minutes had 12 points eight boards and three blocks sylvia had 11 points and six boards in 22 minutes, but McCormick, as I said at the top, 16 minutes, 17 points, 11 boards,

four assists, yet a couple big-time put-back dunks. And Coach hinting after the game, maybe David didn't care for it so much that he was benched in favor of Silvio. So it'll be interesting moving forward who's going to be the starter, as Coach has said that they'll likely continue to at least start with two bigs. All right, next segment we're going to hear from Coach Self regarding East Tennessee State. And we're going to recap the Jayhawks in the NBA action last night on that front as well. Treat yourself to the meal you deserve and have your favorite restaurants come to you with DoorDash.

Right now our listeners can get $5 off their first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and enter promo code LOCKEDON. Listening on the go? If you can't visit DoorDash right now, you can find this and all other offers from LockedOn sponsors at LockedOnPodcasts.com slash offers. This is LockedOn Jayhawks in the NBA. It took place last night.

Perhaps the best performance came from Marcus Morris as his Knicks pick up a much-needed victory. The Knicks defeat the visiting Cavaliers 123-105. Mook had 23 points, 6 boards, and 1 assist. Devontae Graham, the excitement kind of wore off for the Hornets tonight. Back-to-back close victories really on the heels of Dite. And Dite picks up 11.6 boards, 2 assists, but the Hornets lose big, 132-96 against a much more talented Toronto Raptor team.

Ben McLemore, 26 minutes for Houston tonight in their win, but just 2.6 boards and 2 assists. Sheck Diallo for the Suns, who lost 99-85, picked up 4 points and 5 boards in just 5 minutes, so Sheck making the most of his time. Kelly Oubre, by the way, in that game, picked up 15 points and 6 boards. In Andrew Wiggins' third straight game, he did not play for the T-Wolves, this time because of an illness. Timberwolves defeated the Jazz 111-102.

Only action tonight in the NBA in terms of NBA Jayhawks. The Suns at the Kings, so Sheck Diallo and Kelly Oubre are in Sacramento at 9 p.m. There's your look at Jayhawks in the NBA. Wrapping things up here, Locked On Jayhawks, game day edition as the Hawks are taking on East Tennessee State. The Buccaneers of the SoCon coming into Allen Fieldhouse tonight at 7 o'clock. As we've documented, East Tennessee State,

they're projected to be one of the better mid-majors this season, and they're off to a 3-0 start. They have victories over Newberry, Tennessee Martin, and Winthrop. First two games were blowouts. The victory over the Winthrop Eagles was not a blowout. That game was Thursday, 61-58. Winthrop, of course, usually one of the higher-rated mid-major teams. East Tennessee State picked first, picked as the winners of the SOCON in the preseason, right ahead of UNC Greensboro, who was picked second.

So you know this is going to be a talented team because Greensboro gave Kansas a game. That was a game KU won 74 to 62 a couple weeks ago bill self yesterday talked about how this team is pretty strong last year they were one game away from making the tournament and and uh you know they're picked to finish ahead of greensboro this year in their respective league and greensboro i thought was really good so so if they're better than Greensboro, we know we have our work cut out for us. If you remember in the Greensboro game, a lot of that was the Spartans pressing. They had that 1-2-2 press going on, did Wes Miller and company. And it didn't really bother Devon Dotson and the Jayhawks.

It didn't force many turnovers. That was the game after the Duke game where KU turned it over 28 times. Dotson and company had no problem beating the press. Kansas was unable to get in their half-court offense very often against the Spartans, but obviously they did what they needed to do to get the win against a tough team. Greensboro and East Tennessee State both certainly could be in the fold come Selection Sunday in the NCAA Tournament. Bill Self was asked if since they come from the same conference,

if East Tennessee State is going to play a similar way as UNC Greensboro did. For the most part, they're going to be who they are. It's primarily play man, maybe mix in a little zone. Offensively, they know who they want to play through. Certainly, they've got three guys on the perimeter that can really score the ball and and uh and then they got some good size as well and a little bit of depth but but they're gonna they're gonna be scrappy and and basically i think they'll play the same style tomorrow that they plan on playing during every league game i don't think they'll throw anything at us that'll be

something we haven't seen uh because i don't know that that's Steve's style, just like we wouldn't do that as well. Let's look at some of the personnel of this East Tennessee State team. They're led by guard Bo Hodges, who's averaging 15.3 points per game, 6.7 rebounds per game. He also chips in three assists, a pair of blocks, and a steal. So a little bit of everything from Bo Hodges, who's shooting 57% from the field. Trey Boyd III is another guard. He's averaging 13.7 points a game. And Patrick Good, 13 points a game for him. This is a team that will primarily go four guards, as many mid-majors will do. And you look a little closer at some of the numbers Boyd and Good they are both shooting lights out from beyond the arc 47% for Boyd and 56% for Patrick Good as a team this Buccaneers

squad shooting 41% from three now it's early you don't have a huge sample size but still awfully impressive and wouldn't be surprised if we see a lot of four guard lineups with Marcus Garrett out there guarding the four it'll be maybe one or two possessions in the case of East Tennessee State hitting a couple threes before I think Bill Self goes primarily to the four guard look interesting this team also has a guy named Lucas Ngasan he is a big off the bench and he is actually a transfer from Oklahoma State that you maybe haven't heard a ton about. But he plays 17 minutes a game, 6 points, 4 boards, and a block and a half per game for N'Gassan. But mainly this team is ruled by guards. 3-0 projected to win the SoCon.

This is technically, as I mentioned earlier, the first game of the Maui Jim Maui Invitational, although it's of course played right here in Lawrence on campus. Bill Self was asked by media members yesterday when he met with them if there's any overlooking because of the excitement to go to Hawaii and potentially get to face teams of the caliber of BYU, UCLA, Michigan State, some of those teams, or if the Jayhawks' focus is solely on ETSU. We hadn't even mentioned Maui yet, so if they're thinking about it, then we haven't talked about it.

We may talk about this being the opening game to the Maui Invitational or the Maui Gym Classic or whatever it's called now, but no, that hadn't even been discussed yet. I think it'd be fair to say that this KU team is taking the Buccaneers very seriously. Should be a great game. Should be a fun one tonight, 7 o'clock at Allen Fieldhouse. That'll do it for our show. Thanks so much for tuning in.

We heard from Coach Self, Silvio De Sosa, and Christian Brown. And of course, on tomorrow's show, we will recap this game, go through all the numbers, any insight we'll hear from the guys post-game as well. And we'll get a chance tomorrow and the rest of this week to hear from Les Miles as he had his press conference at the beginning of this week. We'll hear his thoughts following the Oklahoma State loss and in advance of the game in Ames against Iowa State. That game is Saturday at 11 a.m. This is Locked On Jayhawks, a product of the Locked On Podcast Network, the local experts on the biggest stories.

And Rock Chalk, Jayhawk.