Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Mayo & Dickinson Lead Kansas Jayhawks Bounce back Win vs NC State While Showing Similar Issues

Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's Locked on Jayhawks, Kansas bounces back, Zeke Mayo went off, but how much was really different for KU? You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. What's happening? Derek Johnson here. This is Locked on Jayhawks. Thanks for making it your first listen every day. We are free and available anywhere you get your podcast,

Starting point is 00:00:31 and you can also find it on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. On today's edition of LOJ, we're breaking down, recapping Kansas 75, NC State 60. Zeke Mayo goes off. I think Weta can tell us about who the primary options should be on the ku offense but still at the end of the day good bounce back win we'll discuss that but also how much really was different from some of the things that have been hurting them because

Starting point is 00:00:56 i don't know if it was as much as you might have thought i will also get to our game awards from the action and what is next with a ku woman's basketball update today's episode of the show is brought to you by game time download the game time app create an account and use code locked on college for 20 off your first purchase with game time kansas 75 nc state 60 and this was uh zeke mayo and hunter dickinson game really really, for the offense, carrying the way, both of them with over 20 points. And, you know, the more I think about it, the more I think it behooves Kansas if they treat Zeke Mayo as the top perimeter option on the offense. And what I mean by that is there's so often where DeJuan Harris is the one handling the ball for an incredible amount of time because he's kind of your lead point guard. And I think DeJuan has done a pretty good job overall this

Starting point is 00:01:50 season. But I think there needs to be even more for Zeke Mayo. I think there's an opportunity there. And I think we saw a little bit in this game, a lot of the two-man action between Zeke Mayo and Hunter Dickinson. And I think that can be really lethal for KU. You have a player in Zeke Mayo who can pass. He can hit a floater. He can hit a three if you go underneath the screen. He can get it to Hunter Dickinson. Dickinson can obviously hit that short roll from the elbow or slip and hit a three-point shot, or he can roll. He can get it to like, there's just a lot of different things that you can cause. You can hit him on the short roll and then he hits somebody else in the corner for three. There's a lot you can accomplish with those two-man actions

Starting point is 00:02:25 between Zeke Mayo and Hunter Dickinson and you see Zeke Mayo going off in this game he went off in the North Carolina game it's been a little bit more inconsistent maybe that's just part of the jumping up at the the level of competition he was going against and now the one he's going against here at Kansas but you know I I can't help but think it best behooves Kansas. If like, if you look up at the, the shots who took the most shots of the game at the end of the day, a hundred against it and Zeke mail, like those are the two you want to consistently go after. And like, and the same way with a hundred Dickinson, you're, you're out there where it's like, you know, um, against specific offenses, you know, ball screen or teams that

Starting point is 00:03:03 can spread you out. Like that's not going to be your forte defensively so you want to take advantage as much as possible of hunter dickinson's strengths his scoring his rebounding his outlet passing and it's the same with zeke mayo like i wouldn't classify zeke mayo as a lockdown defender you know and so the best way to take advantage of him being on the court is letting him be the best offensive option that he can possibly be. And especially right now with AJ Storr, with Rylan Griffin continuing to find their footing, continuing to struggle, continuing to try to figure out how to best fit in and how to play best within that confines of what Bill Self is asking them to. While that's kind of being figured out, yes, you want to still give time and patience to those things happening, but you've kind of got to let it happen organically.

Starting point is 00:03:56 I don't know how much you can force it. You need to give those guys a good leash. You need to let them play and everything. But I don't know that you should go into every game being like, yeah, let's make AJ Storr the number one option. At this point in time, let Zeke Mayo be that guy. And I think it best behooves Kansas when those two players have the ball in their hands a little bit more with Hunter and Zeke Mayo. Now, in regards to the full game as a whole, this was a solid bounce back performance by Kansas. You came out hot you

Starting point is 00:04:26 came out strong you really wanted to see that right you start out the game 15 nothing out of the gates and that's what you wanted to see because it didn't just show that okay like um you know you've maybe you figured some things out or whatever. It showed that you care, I guess. After the Missouri game, after losing like that and looking like that against a rival on the road after a game you had just lost, you were maybe a little bit under the idea of why did it look like that? Why was there not more effort put into that? It felt like a lethargic first half or it felt like a very unclean first half for KU and you didn't get that sense in the early going to this one you got the sense that it

Starting point is 00:05:09 was going to be about bouncing back that did start to to maybe you know affect their pride a little bit that they were going to respond in a real way and that's important to have um you win by 15 at home it was a game that yeah NC State at times might have you know gotten it down to a seven or eight point lead but it never really felt like they truly threatened in the game. And you held them to 37% from the floor. So that's really good. You shot 57% from the floor. That's really good. You led 38 to 26 scoring in points in the paint. That's solid for KU. at the same point in time, as much as this was a solid bounce back win, I can't help but come away from this one and still being like, you know what, a lot of the issues that we've kind of talked about and have kind of hurt this team when they have come up, I don't know that they just went away overnight. Like a lot of them are still there.

Starting point is 00:05:58 Okay, what's one of the big issues for KU? They haven't been a good offensive rebounding team. Like, you know, you look at this year and last year, they've been two of the worst, if not the worst, in Bill Self's entire tenure at KU, if you're looking at offensive rebounding rate. And NC State came into this team as a bad rebounding team. Especially on the defense class, this was not a good defensive rebounding team. So this would have been an opportunity for you to have a good rebounding game if you were Kansas. And instead, NC State wound up with more rebounds than you did in this game. And you look at offensive rebound rate for Kansas,

Starting point is 00:06:36 it wound up, I guess it was still their second best of the season, a bit of a lower bar because of where they're at. But again, NC State wound up with, let's see, 11 offensive rebounds, Kansas at eight. So that was something you thought you would come in and just completely dominate. KU has struggled getting into the free throw line. Well, that didn't change in this game.

Starting point is 00:07:03 They only had seven free throw attempts well that didn't change in this game they only had seven free throw attempts you know okay that didn't that didn't carry over kansas has struggled with giving the other team way more free throw attempts than they have had themselves that was also the case in this game like nc state had like double digit more free throw attempts than you um despite the fact that you have some some players that you would think you know like dewan harris good at getting steals you would think you would be overall as a team good at forcing turnovers, good at forcing steals. And they've been better this season than they were last season, but still Kansas at this point in time is ranked 174th in the country

Starting point is 00:07:34 in turnover rate defense. That didn't really happen in this game. You forced just eight turnovers. What about the three-point defense? Maybe you give them a little bit of credit because NC State only took 15. Like, was that because Kansas did a good job not allowing them to get open looks? That's entirely possible. NC State also shot 40% from three.

Starting point is 00:07:52 So I don't know that I would walk away from being this bad. Yeah, that was great. Three-point defense. What about the bench scoring? Something that, again, has been better this year than last year for Kansas. NC State outscored your bench 18-5. And then, okay, what about A.J. Storr and Rylan Griffin starting to figure it out, starting to look like the guys that you might have expected

Starting point is 00:08:10 coming into the offseason? Well, no, A.J. Storr and Rylan Griffin combined at four points on two of nine shooting. So I don't say all this to be like down in the dumps or to be like the sky is falling, even a 15-point win at all. That's not what I'm saying. Kansas is still a good team, and I think that's what you see in this game.'re a good team you're playing at home you're playing an overmatched opponent and you were ready to bounce back and those are all good things for kansas i point out all those things though to say that everything's not just fixed and in fact everything is probably about the same to where it was to me coming into this game so you know i come away encouraged that they did win that they did bounce, that they looked pretty good doing it.

Starting point is 00:08:46 But I'm also not sure this team is any different. And honestly, you know, they're going to have to kind of prove it on the road more than anything. And you're not going on the road for another like three weeks at this point in time. So it makes it a little bit harder to have those definitive statements. Other notes in this one, Rylan Griffin ended up starting. Maybe he had some good practices.

Starting point is 00:09:07 Didn't really carry over to the game, but that would be a good sign if he's stringing together good practices. KJ Adams had six rebounds. That was good to see. You know, you'd love to see that every game. And then how about this? Shaquille Moore ended up playing in the game. There were certainly some interesting rumors and stuff kind of going around,

Starting point is 00:09:22 so that was good to see him into the game in the first half, but really played limited minutes. Maybe that's something they can just kind of going around. So that was good to see him into the game in the first half, but really played limited minutes. Maybe that's something they can just kind of ramp him up. I do believe he came in before Diggie Coy, which I found very interesting. But he's somebody who, like I said, if you can get him into the rotation as a 10 to 15 minute per game guy, having a really good athlete who can get his own shot for a little bit of time and be a good defender out there, that is a nice 10 to 15 minutes you could throw out from the guard position and so i i think

Starting point is 00:09:48 it would really behoove kansas if they can uh get she kill more work in and into the rotation all right let's uh get on to our game trophies what's next and a little ku women's basketball update after they're off to a strong start this season this episode is brought to you by GameTime, which is a new feature called GameTime Picks that makes getting tickets to see your favorite teams play live even easier. GameTime Picks filters out the fluff to show

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Starting point is 00:10:49 Thank you for tuning in to Locked on Jayhawks, making your first listen every day. You can check out Locked on College Basketball for your second listen. Okay, our game trophies. Best moment of the game. I think just in general, the 15-0 run to get you started for this one, and you hit that second Zeke Mayo three of the 15-0 run, and that extended it the 15-0 run to get you started for this one. And, you know, you hit that second Zeke Mayo three of the 15-0 run and that extended it to 15-0.

Starting point is 00:11:09 That was a really cool moment overall for KU. I also thought Zeke Mayo's and one toward the end of the first half was a pretty important moment because at that point, NC State had crept back to within seven. You know, it easily could have been, you know, maybe even a five-point game or something at the halftime break but that and one by Zeke pushed you back up 10 obviously would have been really cool if if you know you would hit that shot at the end there I think it was from AJ

Starting point is 00:11:33 Stewart at the end of the half but that was an important moment for KU to keep their lead at a sizable distance at the end of the first half from Zeke Mayo so I thought uh both of those would apply for best moment as far as worst moment I don't know this is like more so for the overall game was it me or was the camera like more zoomed out in this game than normal it was like a very small thing to notice but i don't know it felt like everything was a little bit smaller uh i didn't love that i don't know maybe i'm overthinking things uh another hunter dickinson questionable is it flagrant is it dirty is it not foul worst moment that we have to now talk about that and that it happened again. And again, you might this whole time with all these be like, no, it's clean, like everything happens. But it's impossible if you're a ref to not go into this and be like, okay, but we know what the history is. I don't know. It's just it's not fun. It's not fun. And then I think there were like three loose balls that I noticed that were not just like, oh, the ball got stripped or something. But like the ball is like free and available.

Starting point is 00:12:31 And there's multiple guys on both ends, like running for it, colliding with each other, whatever, diving, trying to get there. And KU didn't get any of them. Like they were slow to all of them. Like NC State was the first on the floor of like all of them. Like I think only one of them, like Kansas dove themselves but it was like after nc state dove i don't love seeing that because you know that's something that bills off really emphasizes and going back to the idea of like okay what is the grit what is the want to what is the mentality of this team you know again even though it was a nice bounce back win you would like to see stuff like that changing as far as the process more than the results.

Starting point is 00:13:08 Okay, we're going to give out an award for pass of the game of this one. I'm going to give an honorable mention. Hunter Dickinson caught a short roll and then bullet passed right after the short roll to DeJuan Harris kind of at the wing. He hits a three. That put KU up 44-32 early in the second half. That was good. But the official pass of the game, it also goes to Hunter Dickinson. It was, so you go on a 15-0 run to start the game, but before the 15-0 run, it was a 10-0 run before it got even bigger. And it's 7-0 and Zeke Mayo passes it inside to Hunter Dickinson. And Hunter Dickinson

Starting point is 00:13:44 immediately has the wherewithal. It's just like a touchpad. It was like, I don't know, patty cake. It was volleyball. He just immediately tossed it back to him out of the air. And then Zeke Mayo hits a three, and that makes it 10-0 at the time. That was really cool for the pass game. I'm going to foul you, and you're going to like it award.

Starting point is 00:14:02 That goes to Flory Badunga. The dude had four fouls in seven minutes that is absolutely diabolical from flory badunga uh so far this season he is now averaging 12 minutes per game he's averaging two fouls per game in 12 minutes per game so i mean if he was a the the per 40 is going to be off the charts basically um you know uh that that's going to be something where when we go into next year and if Floyd Badunga is back and you expect him to be the starting center, that's going to be the big question coming into the season.

Starting point is 00:14:32 The defense is there. You see him pinning that block on the backboard. The defense is there. The motor is there. The rebounding is there. The dunking is there. Can he stay in the game and avoid fouls? The good news is that's usually something

Starting point is 00:14:45 that freshmen struggle more at, especially freshman bigs, and they typically do get better as time goes on. Offensive MVP. So I thought long and hard between this one because this is a good debate. Zeke Mayo or Hunter Dickinson. It's pretty obvious it's one of the two. And you know what? I was going to pick Zeke Mayo at with first he led the team in scoring he was super efficient doing it 26 points 9 of 14 shooting 5 of 9 from 3 5 of 7 uh well 3 of 5 at the free throw line he had 5 of 7 of ku's free throw attempts so he had 5 free throw attempts the rest of the team had 2 he also had 2 assists in the game but i i ended i i couldn't just i couldn't ignore what hunter diggins did on the offensive end of the court, man. 21 points, seven assists, zero turnovers.

Starting point is 00:15:31 I mean, how many of Zeke Mayo's made shots were because Hunter Dickinson sucked in the defense and then found him on an open shot. He also had 14 rebounds. Obviously, if this is offensive MVP, the ones that would only matter were the offensive rebounds. He did have two of those. So I ended up honorable mention to Zeke and gave the award to Hunter Dickinson, right? It's five less points, but it is seven assists to zero turnovers as opposed to two assists to two turnovers. Either guy was certainly worthy of that.

Starting point is 00:15:56 And I mean, 47 combined points in a game that NC State scores 60 is very impressive from two guys. I really liked what we saw in some of that two-man offense between the two of them i also felt like in this game hunter dickinson got more short roll opportunities which has typically been more of what we've seen from kj adams and i feel like they they counter like it seems like in some of the recent games when ku does the short rolls of kj adams they're just like okay well then what are you going to do about it we're just going to sag off you you know shoot it whatever uh in this game it felt like ku did more short rolls with

Starting point is 00:16:27 hunter dickinson and because of his really good passing he was able to find guys on the outside and um i don't know if that was an adjustment or something that you know maybe it was just specific to this matchup but i really liked what we saw from from all that stuff uh the quietest 15 point game night goes to dewan har. I know he hit a couple threes, which maybe makes it a little bit more loud, but honestly, when I was looking at the box score after the game, I was like, wait, DeJuan scored 15. Like, again, it's noticeable when you hit a couple of threes and you're like, okay, DeJuan's doing pretty well. Like he probably has eight. I just was surprised when I looked up there and I was like, oh, he scored 15 points. Wow. Good

Starting point is 00:17:04 for him. So six for 11, three of six from three. Uh, I was like, oh, he scored 15 points. Wow, good for him. So six for 11, three of six from three. I felt like that just kind of popped up to me. Defensive MVP for this one. I'm going to go with KJ Adams. He had three blocks for the game, which, I mean, that's always a great number if you can put up that. His primary defense was on Dontreau Stiles. And Stiles hit a couple threes,rees but styles was only three for ten from the

Starting point is 00:17:25 floor he had eight points came into the game shooting almost 50 percent from the floor she held him below his season average for percentage and points per game and then there was even a time or two where like Millbrooks got switched onto KJ and that KJ made the stop on a shot I know there was definitely one earlier in the game. So I thought KJ had a good defensive game and he comes up with those blocks. So he gets defensive MVP. The chair of the game goes to the rolling chair that came out on the court after KJ had that hustle play.

Starting point is 00:17:56 Congrats to the chair of the game. The most prestigious award you could get. All right, we're going to finish up. What's next for KU men's basketball and little KU women's basketball update. This is Locked on Jayhawks. Our episode of the show today is brought to you by FanDuel. Get ready to tackle the NFL action with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook, because right now new customers can bet $5 and get $150 in bonus bets if you win. FanDuel's sportsbook app gives you everything you need

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Starting point is 00:18:39 if you win your first $5 bet. That's at FanDuel.com. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with fan dual and official sports or partner of the NFL and the lockdown podcast network. I finishing things up here. What's next for KU men's basketball. They're going to be taking on Brown. That'll be a game coming on Sunday of next week.

Starting point is 00:18:59 They have finals week coming up. So they'll practice a little bit, but obviously they'll have to deal with that too. And then they'll take on Brown on Sunday, which those games are always tough. You play an Ivy League opponent. Brown was in the Ivy League championship a season ago. You're playing them right before winter break. Guys might be looking ahead to Christmas.

Starting point is 00:19:16 We've seen those games be closer than you might expect, so maybe you expect it to be close this go-around. And then we'll have the Big 12 hole opener after that on december 31st okay a little ku woman's basketball update too so ku woman's basketball is up to a nine and one start so far this season samaya nichols has been absolutely killing it so far uh she's shooting 61 at the rim she's shooting shooting over 40 on uh-point shots so far this season. She's averaging 20 points per game. I mean, she has been an absolute monster to this point in time.

Starting point is 00:19:51 But what's been really cool to see so far for KU, it's not just Samaya Nichols taking that next step. She was already so good as a freshman, and she's been even better so far as a sophomore. But it's also Regan Williams, the 6'3 Ford freshman from Park Hill South High School in Kansas City. She has been fantastic as a true freshman, right? I mean, didn't come in with the same. I mean, obviously was thought of as a well-recruited player, but not McDonald's All-American level like you were thinking Smythe Nichols.

Starting point is 00:20:20 But she's been awesome as a freshman. And those two have been key. Kansas has started 9- one on the season. They play tomorrow, or I guess if you're listening to this today, on Sunday against Penn State. It'll be a good test. It is a top 50 opponent. If you look at Bart Korvik, he does have a top 50 win over Auburn, but it should be a good game.

Starting point is 00:20:37 And then they start Big 12 play the following Saturday against Baylor. So they actually start a little bit early than the Mets. But a good start for the women's looking to punch off or cap off, I guess I'm trying to say, the non-conference schedule with that win over Penn State if they can get it done and then big-time conference play because we always know the Big 12 pretty loaded on the women's basketball side as well. That'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:20:57 You can find our show anywhere you get your podcasts, including our YouTube page. We'll see you next time with LOJ.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Mayo & Dickinson Lead Kansas Jayhawks Bounce back Win vs NC State While Showing Similar Issues

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