Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Locked On Jayhawks - 11.4.19

Episode Date: November 4, 2019

KU falls in Sunflower Showdown; Initial preview on Champions Classic Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, Jayhawk Nation? Welcome in to this Monday edition of Locked On Jayhawks. 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, giving you insight, numbers, and a chance to hear from all the voices within Kansas athletics. Well, the only good thing from this weekend in terms of KU football was that the sun did in fact rise yesterday following the loss to K-State and it was just an extremely disappointing game. We're going to recap that and talk about some of the stats. The only good thing that happened during the game was

the fans showed out. Jayhawk Nation had a pretty good showing. There were of course a lot of fans from the visiting team, the Wildcats, who made their way east from Manhattan and saw their Wildcats really put together a dominant performance. I think if you were to say anything different, then you would be wrong because this game was completely controlled by Skyler Thompson and company and K-State under first-year head coach Chris Kleiman is now 6-22. Their bowl eligibility, they're thinking about much bigger things than that. They're thinking about perhaps a Big 12 championship, perhaps a BCS Bowl, because they have got to be feeling good. A win at home a couple weeks ago against Oklahoma,

and then that big win on Saturday against the Jayhawks in Lawrence. So this game, the know, the stats are going to be ugly. The game was ugly. We liked where we were at from the beginning in terms of KU was hanging with the Wildcats. The game really got out of hand in the fourth quarter when KU opted a pair of drives to go for it because they really felt like they had no other option and when doing so K-State got great field position following that but unfortunately Kansas was not able to convert those fourth down conversions and really it was all Wildcats throughout. This game began with Skyler Thompson doing what he does best. KU got a three and out and then Skyler Thompson

just was killing the Jayhawks, running the ball and throwing the ball. At the end, it wasn't the passing numbers that hurt KU as much as it was the rushing numbers of Thompson. But K-State put together a 10-play, 88-yard drive on their very first possession. KU came back and got a field goal, the lone offensive scoring drive of the day that really mattered. Of course, late in the game. KU came back and got a field goal, the lone offensive scoring drive of the day that really mattered. Of course, late in the game, KU got a touchdown drive, but that was a problem because 7-3, that wasn't going to be good enough for KU, but that's all they could manage on offense. Thompson got the ball back, and he led the Cats down the field again. Another 10-play

drive for 78 yards. It was 14-3. A Blake Lynch field goal made it 17-3 Cats at halftime, and then in the second half, Thompson scored again on two occasions, and then the fifth-string running back scored for K-State for their final drive, a 14-yard touchdown from Burns, and it was 38-3 Cats. I mentioned those last two touchdowns kind of made it look worse on the scoreboard for the Jayhawks but they really were because the offense could not give the defense any sort of a chance and that's what Les Miles said after the game the offense could not stay on the field long enough and the defense couldn't get off the field and that just led to all sorts of problems in a dominant performance from K-State. Look at some of the final numbers.

First downs, K-State 23, KU 12, and that brings us to time of possession. K-State had the ball for 38 minutes of game time, whereas the Jayhawks had just 22 minutes, and that was big. I mean, you look, and K-State had just nine completed passes. Thompson was 9 of 16 for 129 yards and no touchdowns through the air. But look at what K-State did on the ground, led by Thompson, who had 17 carries for 131 yards and three touchdowns. It was the third string running back, Trotter, who had 20 carries for 93 yards and a touchdown, and I mentioned Tyler Burns had the final touchdown of the game for the Cats.

Really, this was all about the run game. K-State in all totaled 342 yards on the ground and just 61 for the Jayhawks. Total plays in this one, all K-State 76-51 on that front, and third down conversions, perhaps aside from the rushing yards differential, perhaps this was the most telling stat of the day. K-State was 11 for 17 on third down conversions, and KU was just two of 10. Red zone scores, both teams were 100% in the red zone, but KU had just two opportunities. That early field goal that Liam Jones connected from 34 yards out, and then, of course, the final touchdown of the game. It was a Manny Miles run with under a minute to go

that gave KU their lone touchdown of the day. Final numbers for KU, Carter Stanley. He left this game in the fourth quarter when this game was well in hand with a knee injury, but everything we're hearing is that Carter should be back and good to go following the bye week. KU travels to Stillwater on November 16th. Stanley was 13 of 23 in this one for 115 yards, no touchdowns, and he also threw two interceptions, and they were really backbreakers

because KU, two different occasions, got the ball feeling like, all right, maybe this is the drive. We can get going and get some of the firepower that we saw the first two games under new offensive coordinator Brent Dierman. Maybe we can get something going. But both of those drives, the very first play was a Carter Stanley interception. And credit K-State. Like I said, they've proven that they can beat some of the top teams in the country already this year.

Got a win over an SEC opponent, Mississippi State, and of course they had that big win in Manhattan a couple weeks ago against Oklahoma, but Stanley just was not happy with himself after the game. He was emotional, feeling like he let his guys down. On the ground, Pucco had 14 carries for 61 yards. He was bottled up pretty good by the Cats. Velton Gardner, three carries for 16 yards. Manny Miles had two carries for 11 yards and a touchdown. And then receiving the ball, not much there either. Andrew Parchment led the way with five catches for 49 yards. Stephon Robinson had four catches for 62 yards.

Charlotte had four catches for 49 yards. And that was pretty much it. There was not a lot of excitement other than the excitement leading up to this game where there were a lot of fans coming in from Manhattan, and of course a lot of Jayhawk Nation was excited for this as well, but it did not go as planned as K-State wins it 38-10. And now for our Jayhawks, we're going to look forward to three final games. Of course, this is a bye week, and on Locked on Jayhawks this week,

we're going to have a lot of basketball talk, of course. We've got the big game of the Champions Classic tomorrow against Duke and then we've got another game on Friday against UNC Greensboro back in the field house we'll talk a lot of basketball this week but we certainly are going to stick with this KU football team they're just three and six on the year one and five in Big 12 play and it's not going to get any easier. Oklahoma State with a win on Saturday improved to 6-3, so they're already bowl eligible. Iowa State is almost there as well. They're 5-3.

They were idle this weekend, and then you're going to end at home. Your last home game of the year is against Baylor. The surprise of college football probably is they're undefeated at 8-0. They're 5-0 in Big 12 play, so it's not going to get any easier for these Jayhawks, but we certainly hope that they have some of the spirited performances in their back pocket that we've seen following tough losses. We saw after the Coastal Carolina loss, KU came out and had an impressive win against Boston College. Of course, the tough loss in Austin a few weeks back, KU loses on a last second field goal. They come back and they have that emotional win over Texas Tech on homecoming.

Hopefully we can see some of that moving forward. Looking to a bowl, I've talked about that a lot. I felt like this game was obviously one Kansas needed to feel like they had a realistic shot. I think that this probably does KU in for any chance they had to get a bowl game, but they do still have three games left. You never know. Crazier things have happened, and we'll stick with them until they tell us that we can't go to a bowl and that no one invited us.

Absolutely. We'll hear from Les Miles and some of the guys this week. He talked to reporters after the game. No press conference from Coach Miles this week on a bye week, but, of course, we'll try to get you as much content as possible. Whatever I can get, I'll try to provide for you here on Locked on Jayhawks. Coming up next, we're going to recap the Friday Five, and then we'll transition to talk about KU Hoops.

Big game tomorrow. We all know that. We love when the college hoop season starts with that Champions Classic, and this year it's in Madison Square Garden, and the opponent is Duke, a team that Kansas has beaten three straight times. All that's coming up next. The Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. All right, well, let's recap the Friday five from this week, trying to get on the right foot after a one and four week last week

and ended up with a 500 record, exactly two and two and one in the five games this week, five lines that we talked about. Start with the losers. Notre Dame was a big favorite at home against Virginia Tech, and I expected Ian Book and company to come through in a big way following their disappointing blowout loss at the Big House to Michigan last week. That was not the case.

Notre Dame did survive, but they needed a last second touchdown to do so. They end up clipping Virginia Tech by a score of 21-20. Ian Book, I mentioned he was a reason that I thought Notre Dame would have a chance to blow out Virginia Tech because I thought he would get right. He had a pretty good game. He did throw 53 passes, 341 yards, and two touchdowns. He also threw two interceptions, 13 carries, 50 yards, and a touchdown. So kind of an uneven performance from Book. Notre Dame does not cover, although they did beat Virginia Tech. Other loss this week was Washington and Utah. This was much closer to meeting the line.

Washington led this game 14-13 at halftime, and it was back and forth. But Utah covered the three points. It was Utah 33, Washington 28, as the Utes look to continue to have a fight, give the Pac-12 a chance to make the college football playoff. Right now, Utah ranked eighth in the country, 8-1 this season. They look like the Pac-12's best bet. All right, the tie on the week, and if you got this line at 6.5, it turned into a win. I liked SMU plus 6 at Memphis.

This was a game that featured 102 total points, and Memphis won by exactly 6, 54-48, so a push on the week. It was SMU's first loss as the other ranked team in their conference, Memphis, defeats the Mustangs. Both of those teams ranked in the top 25. They are both 8-1. SMU plus 6 or Memphis minus 6. Both pushes in this one. Two winners this week. Miami, the U, plus 3 at Florida State. That was an easy cover as the U won outright 27-10. Mentioned Jaron Williams taking over at quarterback again for Miami and the redshirt freshman delivered 21 to 37, 313 yards and two touchdowns going the whole way for the Hurricanes as they pick up that ACC victory. Miami now just one win away from bowl eligibility

at five and four. And then my NFL bet was the other winner. That was the game in London this morning and it was not particularly close either. It was Deshaun Watson and company disposing of the Jaguars easily in London 26 to 3 Watson continues to play at an MVP level he and Russell Wilson I think would probably be the front runner for the NFL MVP right now and despite not not having J.J. Watt, the Texans defense allowed just three points to Gardner Minshew and company. So overall, a two and two and one week, a push, a push is a win in the betting world. So we'll absolutely take that. All right. So an unfortunate Saturday, absolutely for KU football. And we'll keep tabs on that the rest of this week. And of course, always here on Locked On Jayhawks. But time to talk KU basketball.

We've got the first official game of the season tomorrow night, Champions Classic against Duke. Three versus four, the first game of that four-some, and then you've got two versus one. Kind of crazy. It's the first time in the history of the Classic. This is year number nine, I believe, that both games are featuring top four teams. All four teams will be represented tomorrow night at Madison Square Garden. So the Jayhawks will battle Duke, a team they most recently played.

You probably remember that game in the Elite Eight a couple years ago. Grayson Allen and the shot that did not fall. KU ended up winning in overtime. That game I'll always remember because Malik Newman, that's really the one that sprung him to be named the region's most outstanding player. And how about the fact that he scored 32 points and all 13 of KU's overtime points were scored by Malik Newman. Of course, Devontae Graham, Sfi Mikhailuk had huge roles in that as well. Sfi hit the big three to tie it late in regulation. A lot of good memories in that one.

And then you think back to some other KU-Duke matchups. How about Frank Mason's game winner? KU had a big lead over Duke the last time these teams hooked up in the Champions Classic. Three years ago, Duke came all the way back to tie it, but then Frank Mason, the future National Player of the Year, hit the game winner, and KU won that one. And then way back when, three years before that, KU's first win in the Champions Classic came

when Andrew Wiggins and Joel Embiid led the Jayhawks on a victory over Jabari Parker and the Blue Devils. So some good memories of late in this series between KU and Duke, but now we focus on starting the season 1-0 and starting the season healthy. That's something we're really looking forward to doing. Kansas, you know, they had Devon Dotson miss the first game of the exhibition season, and Isaiah Moss also did not play. Dotson returned in the game against Pitt State on Thursday, and he played over 20 minutes, so he looked 100%. He told reporters after the game that he is 100%. Isaiah Moss played five first-half minutes for KU. He got up four shots, made his first three,

but made his first three-pointer, I should say, missed his last three shots. Moss did not appear in the second half and clearly is not 100%. Bill Self saying after the game on Thursday, they'll have to see how practice goes with Moss. You certainly want him and his shooting ability to be out there if possible tomorrow night. Of course, KU's got the depth. Talked about it a lot on Friday, how many guys this team has and how excited I am for them. But it all starts with the point guard, Devon Dotson. He returned, and he missed nine of his first ten shots. Very surprising for a guy last year who was incredibly efficient. But getting his feet wet a little bit,

and he talked about how when things go bad to start, you just got to keep shooting. No, just keep shooting. You know, it's a tune-up game for a reason. So it's getting legs back underneath you and, you know, finding that touch. The man who led the Jayhawks in scoring in both of the exhibition games was sophomore Ochai Abadji. Abadji scored 21 against Fort Hayes State.

KU won that game by 30. And then in the Jayhawks' 60-point blowout victory over Pitt State, Ochai led all scorers with 19. Speaking of depth, KU scores 102 points. Ochai leads all scorers with 19, and no one else has more than 13. You got McCormick with 13, Dotson had 12. You had four guys with nine. Lightfoot, DeSosa, Brown, and Inaruna had nine, and Yudoka Azubuki had eight.

So KU really showcasing their depth, and everybody had a chance, of course, to play a lot of minutes in the blowout win. But Ochai Abadji, he was very efficient in the game against Pitt State. He was 7 of 8 from the field and 5 of 6 from 3. Here's Bill Self talking about his wing. Tonight he looked pure, you know, and I hope we can bottle that. And, you know, the other night, I think he was 3 for 9, but started out about 1 for 5 or 6. but he kept shooting and and and that's that's so good to see such a good athlete and you know he'll be able to drive the ball better if people have to crowd him and and uh i think that that was you know great to see tonight

ochai was 8 of 15 in the first exhibition game against fort hayes state three of nine threes in the second game against pitt state abadji, as I mentioned, was even more efficient, but he was putting up those numbers and he was doing more than just shooting. Abadji had six assists and no turnovers. KU, seven turnovers in game number one and four turnovers in game number two and 27 assists on 40 made field goals against Pitt State. KU sharing the ball and they're not throwing it out of bounds. They're not throwing it to the other team. Obviously, you're facing MIAA competition. You're going to be facing a top five team in the country on Tuesday. It's going to be very different, but I think there's a lot to like

from what we've seen in the first two exhibition games. The only two exhibition games this KU team will play, and now we've got Duke. We're going to preview Duke. We'll hear from Bill Self and Devon Dotson and some of their thoughts on facing always a tough team to face in college basketball. One of the best programs in college basketball history, the Duke Blue Devils. And we'll hear from those guys after the break. With Roman, you can get a free online evaluation and ongoing

care for ED, all from the comfort and privacy of your home. Just go to GetRoman.com to get a free online visit and free two-day shipping. The Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Champions Classic tips off tomorrow. KU and Duke at 6 o'clock Central Time,

and then it's Kentucky and Michigan State at 8.30. Always an exciting time. It's year number nine of the Champions Classic, and this year it'll be in New York in Madison Square Garden. Feel free to follow me on Twitter, at Sean Kellerman. You can follow the show on Twitter at LO underscore Jayhawks. Talked a little bit last segment about kind of the last three games in this series. They've all been Jayhawk victories.

Overall, the Blue Devils lead the head-to-head series 7-5. Bill Self and Mike Krzyzewski both have three wins and three losses against each other. So Bill's won the last three, and they've been good. If you're looking at total records for all the teams in this, Duke is 5-3. They have the best record. They're highlighted by a 3-0 record against Michigan State. KU and Kentucky are both 4-4, and Michigan State is 3-5. And the Champions Classic, an event that tipped off in 2011,

and it was going to just be three years where everybody played each other and around Robin, but it has since to just be three years where everybody played each other in a round robin, but it has since been extended time and time again, and now it's currently set to run through 2022. So this will be the final game of the third series, and hopefully KU wins. They can obviously get over 500. They started, of course, dropping the first two years of this, and then they picked up that first victory over Duke behind Wiggins and Embiid. But anyway, we'll look forward to that, of course, tomorrow night. Perhaps the biggest matchup tomorrow night is the matchup of the two

guys who, when they announced they were coming back to school, really, that was huge for the whole college basketball world because Devon Dotson, the man who runs the show for the Jayhawks, and Trey Jones, point guard for Duke, they are two of the best guards in college basketball and that's going to be the number one matchup that everyone is looking toward tomorrow. But it's going to be a lot more than that, but as expected that was kind of the initial questions that were being asked and Bill Self was asked about Devon versus Trey after the Pitt State win on Thursday. I think it'll be a good one. You know, two speed guys and, you know, Trey, of course, I've known him a while because

we recruited Tyus so hard, but Trey is a great leader and a terrific point guard and he's fast and active and those sorts of things. And Devon has a lot of the same physical characteristics. So it'll be an interesting matchup. The thing about it is they pressure so much and they have, but that's also what Devon's good at is attacking pressure too. So it'll be interesting to see how those two kind of try to handle each other and keep each other in front and those sorts of things. And the point guards for the other two teams aren't too shabby either. Of course, Kentucky is sporting a freshman, Tyrese Maxey, who's highly recruited and he will be wanting to put on a show

in his first official collegiate game. And preseason player of the year by many outlets, Michigan State's Cassius Winston returns for his senior year, and he, of course, will be under a watchful eye as well. But Bill Self continues talking about Devon and Trey, and while, yes, it's interesting to try to figure out who's going to be the top guard in the country, there's a lot more than that that's going to take place in the game tomorrow night. When you're trying to evaluate and it's so unclear on, you know,

who's the best lead guard in the country, and there's six or seven viable candidates, you know, I think that any time you get an opportunity to go against one of those other candidates, I think you want to be your best. But it's not Devon versus Jones. It's Kansas versus Duke. And I'm sure both players will certainly be told that and know that going into Tuesday. The point guard battle will certainly be an important one tomorrow. But as coach says, it's not just those guys battling in one-on-one. It's a full team of guys. Duke has a couple top freshmen that we know a little bit about.

Vernon Carey was obviously very highly recruited. He's a center. He's 6'10", but he can stretch it, as can Matt Hurt, a guy that KU really wanted, and it was down to the Jayhawks and Duke for Matt Hurt. He chose the Blue Devils. He's 6'9", forward forward who obviously can stretch it. He'll play the four. And then another guy KU wanted, Cassius Stanley, 6'6 wing guard out of Los Angeles. He'll be out there as well. So you got a lot of young guys for this Duke team going

up against a relatively veteran Kansas team. Yeah, guys like Ochai and Devon are just sophomores, but today's college basketball world, that essentially qualifies as being a veteran. Yudoka is a Buki, a senior. You've got Silvio De Sosa, who's a junior. Mitch Lightfoot, of course, will not play in this one. It was announced over the weekend that Lightfoot is going to be redshirting this season, at least that's the initial plan. Hopefully everybody can stay healthy and Mitch is able to get another year on the back end of his eligibility here at Kansas. Other guys Duke has we know a little bit about. We talked about Trey Jones and then they've got a couple bigs who can shoot as usually is the case for Duke. Jack White and Joey Baker. Baker an interesting case. He's a sophomore six foot seven.

He actually redshirted the entire year last year for Duke until February 23rd. After Zion Williamson got hurt, they lifted Joey Baker's redshirt, and he debuted at the end of February and didn't score a point until game one of the NCAA tournament for the Blue Devils. So he's a guy who lost a year of eligibility because of that. Now, we don't know if he would have been here four years anyway, but Baker will be out there. So Duke, they're going to be starting a lot of those freshmen.

Kerry will start, Matt Hurt will start, and for Kansas, they didn't get Cassius Stanley. So after that, they went out and they got Jalen Wilson, and of course when they didn't get Matt Hurt, they got Tristan Inaruna. Wilson and Inaruna are going to likely have roles on this year's Kansas team, but they're not going to be thrown in to starter roles like some of these guys for Duke. So that'll be interesting. Javin Delorier does return for Duke. He's a senior, 6'10". So he and his veteran sophomore point guard, Trey Jones, are the top returners for this Duke team. And we know about Kansas, and if you have not heard about Duke's first two exhibition games, they were very interesting as Duke in the first game faced Northwest Missouri State,

which is obviously not a Division I team, and you're thinking, okay, exhibition time. But Northwest Missouri State almost won that game. Duke won 69-63. Now, let's point out that Northwest Missouri State isn't your standard non-Division I team. The Bearcats went 38-0 last year and won the national championship at their level. So they gave the Blue Devils a good game. And then Duke, after hearing, I'm sure, all too many things coming out in the media about how they only beat this team by six points,

they took it out on a team called Fort Valley State. Duke won that game 126-57. So Duke had no problem doing away with Fort Valley State, Duke won that game 126-57. So Duke had no problem doing away with Fort Valley State, and they got good performances across the board. Before I mention Joey Baker does the leading score, 22 points on 6 of 8 shooting from 3, but they had 7 guys in double figures in that game, did the Blue Devils. Matt Hurt had 19 points on 9 of 13 shooting in just 18 minutes.

So there's a lot to look forward to for this game tomorrow. And, of course, we are going to be having a packed show tomorrow talking about the Jayhawks and the Blue Devils as KU looks to go over.500 in this Champions Classic. We'll hear a lot more from Bill Self and what he thinks KU needs to do in order to knock off Duke. And we'll hear from KU players as well as we can't wait. Excited always for this event, for the start of college basketball season.

High hopes as always for this Kansas team. Of course, Duke feels the same about their guys as well. The first of two games this week for the Jayhawks. So a lot coming up the rest of this week. Thanks for listening to Locked on Jayhawks. Remember, you can catch me Monday through Friday. Shoot me a follow on Twitter at LO underscore Jayhawks. Locked on Jayhawks, part of the Locked On Podcast Network,

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