Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - MISSING DARRYN PETERSON: Offense, Rebounding COLLAPSE vs UConn | Kansas Jayhawks Fall to Huskies

Starting point is 00:00:00 Turns out not having Darren Peterson, it kind of sucks. It hurt the KU offense. They lose to Yukon. We break down what went wrong for the Jayhawks. 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 going on, Derek Johnson here? This is Locked on Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:00:30 Thanks for making it your first listen every day. Thank you for making the Lockdown Podcast Network, the number one sports podcast network. We are recapping Kansas, Yukon. They fall by five at home in Allen Fieldhouse. It's a dreadful second half on offense and on the glass. End up dooming KU in the end without Darren Peterson. Obviously, no, Tarras Reed as well for Connecticut.

Starting point is 00:00:50 We're going to break it all down on today's episode. What we're wrong for KU? What does this all mean? What are the positives, negatives from the game? We'll get to game awards. And what's next for KU? Today's episode of the show is brought to you by Fandual Sportsbook. If you want to be right in the middle of the action this season, visit fandwell.com

Starting point is 00:01:07 and place your first NFL or place your NFL live bets all season long. So Kansas drops 61 to 56. And, you know, honestly, like coming in, if you would have said UCon was going to score 61 points, you obviously felt like you would have a shot to win the game. And then if I told you that and that KU had 33 in the first half, you'd think, okay, that target number seems pretty doable for the second half. The second half offense exploded for KU. They finished one of their last eight,

Starting point is 00:01:34 but it didn't start much better for KU in the second half. And at the end of the day, the offense just wasn't able to do enough. You certainly missed Darren Peterson. You shot 35% from the field. You were 5 of 18 from 3. It did get to the foul line, but you weren't getting enough offensive rebounds.

Starting point is 00:01:53 You weren't getting enough second chance points. You weren't scoring inside. And it was just kind of a combination. of everything. Like, Trey White had a down game. He had just eight points after coming in with a bunch of straight good games. For Bryson Taylor, he goes just two of eight from the floor with four points. Flory Bedunga had another, you know, not great offensive game going just four of nine from the floor.

Starting point is 00:02:16 You didn't really get much of anything from, I mean, you got the one dunk from Cole Rosario, but two points combined from Dawson and Rosario, which without Darren Peterson, you're counting on those guys to get you more than two points. And so the combination of those things, the poor shooting, the poor offensive execution, the inability to score inside, that is kind of the storyline. But if I'm being completely honest, that's not the thing that I really take away from this game. What have we talked about all season, all off season, whatever? This is not a team whose identity is a run and gun offensive team.

Starting point is 00:02:50 This is a defensive team that you want to muck up games, win on the margins, and have a number one draft pick in Darren Peterson leading the way. Well, you didn't have Peterson leading the way tonight. You did kind of muck up the game. You forced Yukon to 61 points. Yukon is one of the best offenses in the country. And I know Yukon, you know, got a little better offensively in the second half, but they still shot just 42%. I'll be honest, I still feel really good about this KU defense. I still feel good about this Kansas team, even after another loss. The issue here is, I think, obviously very different. The result, you got blown out by North Carolina in the second half. This one ends up being a close loss.

Starting point is 00:03:28 But I think kind of similar in the same vein that I walk away from the Carolina loss. Like this is kind of a mix of the Duke one because you come away from it without Darren Peterson going, okay, you know, you played a good team close. Like you played them well. But I also walk away from it from the North Carolina game where it's like there were moments in the second half in the North Carolina game where it felt like you weren't playing to your identity. It felt like you weren't playing to the identity of being more of a defensive team in the second half. and in this one you did play to the identity of being a defensive team you just didn't play to the accompanying part of that which is doing the little things one of those would be rebounding and so i know the offense is going to rule the day and going to be the calling card and everything here's the thing one ucon's a really good team um who is good on offense and on defense two you did not have a good offensive game we don't need to make any mistakes about that um even for you know your standards this was not a good offensive game, but also you were without Darren Peterson, but also that's kind of what this team is going to be this year. It's going to be a very inconsistent offensive

Starting point is 00:04:33 team. That's how you built this team. That is the player personnel of this team. I'm not overly concerned about what we saw in the offensive end, right? I know that sounds silly. Like, yes, if you told me there to shoot 35% every game, I'd be concerned. But the thing to me is this game was still within reach of winning if you would have rebounded the ball better in the second half. because Yukon ends up scoring 14 second chance points. They outscored you 14 to 5 in second chance points. That's a nine point difference. You lost by five.

Starting point is 00:05:04 And we mentioned coming in, Yukon and their big games this year, whether it was the two exhibitions against Boston College and Michigan State, whether it was the games against like Arizona and Illinois and so on, did not have good offensive and defensive rebound rate numbers. And yet you let them get into this in the second half specifically with the offensive rebounding. So you look at the first half, Yukon had three offensive rebounds. KU had 15 defensive rebounds. Kansas was doing an excellent job in the first half on the

Starting point is 00:05:36 defensive glass, right? That means they're getting five of every six. It's a very good defensive rebound rate. But in the second half, Yukon wound up with eight offensive rebounds. Kansas wound up with six defensive rebounds. Or excuse me, sorry, I had eight defensive rebounds, eight defensive rebounds in the second half. So they had as many offensive rebounds in the second half as you had defensive rebounds. One of every two misses, they're picking up, right? If you cut that number in half, if you get it down to, you know, four of the, as opposed

Starting point is 00:06:05 to the eight, I don't think they win the game. And so, again, you do want to figure out the offense. I'm not trying to say that, oh, it's a loss. Or like, you do want to figure it out. And there are certain things you need to be better at. And obviously, adding Darren Peterson to the fold would certainly help in that area. but again for me the expectation is that this is kind of what that team is this is the identity so you need to find other ways to win you need to understand that hey we're not going to be the

Starting point is 00:06:32 team that beats you by outscoring you so we need to win on the glass we need to win on the defense end and that was what was disappointing in this one for me that you did get kind of worked in the second half on the glass now I think besides that the other big negatives from this one like I mentioned, Florey struggling offensively for the second straight, just not really getting much from the two big lineup offensively in this one, right? You get just 15 combined points on six of 17 shooting from the two bigs. I don't know. Is it just me or are we seeing, like you see a decent amount of possessions

Starting point is 00:07:05 where Florey gets the ball on the block or posted up or whatever? Why are we not seeing more of that with Bryson Tiller? Because isn't the idea that Tiller is the offensive big with the finesse, whereas Florey is more of the rebounding and defensive big. Like, should we be seeing more of Tiller on the block? I feel like most of the shots we're seeing Tiller take right now are like either threes or in transition or off a pick and roll or something like that. Like, I don't know, should he be getting the ball more on the block like back to the basket

Starting point is 00:07:32 or he can face up? I don't know, just kind of a quick thought there. Obviously, the offense overall, the defensive rebounding, we're not great in this game. I do think it's also, you know, where Jaden Dawson and Colorsario are they out of the trust tree already for Bill Self they weren't in the game at the end when you were down three with the ball with a chance of tie you needed a three and I mean they ended up kind of driving which you know that was fine if you would have ended up scoring on drive and then you foul them and you know a one and one like who knows but um they weren't even in the game so some of these early moment games can really tell us who is in the trust tree and I think it's pretty clear which guys are kind of in that situation now I will say just ending with a little bit of a positive I I think it was exciting to see kind of a backup performance from El Marco Jackson. It wasn't as good as the Tennessee game, but he still wound up with 11 points. He was four of nine from the floor.

Starting point is 00:08:23 He hit the two threes for the game. And I know El Marco had that hot stretch at the beginning that fueled that. But one of the things that I really appreciated there was, you know, El Marco missed his first shot and a younger El Marco misses his first shot. And then that might be his only shot he takes in the next 10 minutes. he immediately shot afterwards and was aggressive shooting after that. And even in the second half, like, it's not just the aggressiveness to shoot the ball. It's the aggressiveness to drive the ball for a dude that's that athletic.

Starting point is 00:08:55 And he was driving in the second half, you know, he was getting into the free throw line a little bit. I know he split that one pair at the free throw line. I know he missed just one of three on the free throws. He missed the and one free throw opportunity. That's another thing. Like if you're Kansas, okay, the shooting. is going to come and go for this team with this personnel, you can't afford to miss

Starting point is 00:09:16 some of those clutch free throws and have some of the rebounding issues. But point being, I appreciated the aggressiveness and I feel good that El Marco's now done this in kind of back-to-back games. Like I said, I feel good about the defense still. You held the Yukon to 61 points. And especially if you look at just the first shot defense,

Starting point is 00:09:32 it was pretty excellent for KU. And again, I think the bottom line here is this. You can't keep doing this. I can't keep giving the spiel about like, oh, you played a good team close so it shows what this team can be. Because eventually you hit a point where that runs dry. I don't think we've hit that point yet. It's Duke and Yukon, who are two of the five best teams at the country and both of them without

Starting point is 00:09:55 Darren Peterson. I still feel good about this Kansas team where they are. I still like the players on this team. I still feel like they are, you know, when they're losing games, it's not, it's because of either skill related things. Like they're just not, they just don't have, you know, shooting or scoring or offense or whatever, but it's not because they're not trying. It's not because they're just completely like, I don't know, running rampant on what Bill Self wants them to do.

Starting point is 00:10:22 I just kind of view it as like, okay, you've been beaten a couple times by teams who are more talented than you. And when you don't have Darren Peterson, that's going to be the case. But when you get Peterson back, like if Peterson plays, yeah, I think Kansas wins this game. Now, if Terrace Reed plays and Peterson plays, then maybe it's back to more of a coin flip, though. obviously Peterson, who's projected to be the number one pick in the draft, Reed, who's not projected to be the number one pick in the draft. I think Peterson probably has a little bit bigger value to his team, especially knowing how important he is to the KU offense, which we saw point blank in this game. So I do think they win the game with Darren Peterson, which

Starting point is 00:10:55 also adds to the frustration that he didn't play, obviously. But like, if this leads to Peterson being healthy for the final stretch and the final push of the season, it is all going to be worth it. And I looked like Houston last year. They played for the national title game, and maybe they should have won the national title. They had three losses around this point of the season as well, right? I think they lost two or three games in the players era last year, and they ended up being just okay. Now you have to learn your lesson. You have to find the right balance of kind of getting hot. Yeah, they were four and three. And that doesn't mean every three lost team through this point is going to figure that out. You've got some tough games kind of come up here with Missouri and

Starting point is 00:11:34 Nancy State who aren't the Duke and Yukon elite but are still good teams that should be tournament teams to kind of prove your worth again. Will Peterson come back? It's going to be huge and this team really needs it. I think you saw why tonight. But, you know, still some positives, still some negatives. I think we've just continued to dig into what this team exactly is through some of these games and, you know, some positives. Also, you lost the game, though, and this is Kansas basketball. Let's get to our game awards next. Today's episode of the show is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. And at FanDuel, NFL Sundays, move fast.

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Starting point is 00:12:54 Fanduel, the game moves fast, and so can you. Thanks for joining us and making lockdown Jayhawks, your first listen every day. I think of every day or is catching each and every episode of the show. Okay, moments of the game. You know, for a little there, like the Jamarie McDowell first half step back three,

Starting point is 00:13:12 that was super fun. The L. Marco Jackson, a kind of first half run and a little jolt that he went on. Those were really fun moments for KU. When it felt like you were going to start to make a comeback, like the Flory, one-handed alley-up that made a 55-51,

Starting point is 00:13:31 which I don't know why that wasn't a foul. that was really cool the melvin council three to make it 55 54 kind of felt like okay are you going to do to you con what you did last time you hosted them or you kind of make this late comeback to win this game but obviously in the end the moment that defines the game to me there was like a one possession where yukon had i think it was like four shots on offensive rebounds and uh eventually it was mullins who i think made the shot at the other end it was just like those are such backbreakers for you. You could probably also just in general, like, refer to the different moments that KU had dry spells, but there were like three different long dry spells in this game. So it's hard to say

Starting point is 00:14:12 exactly like which one you would pick. I mean, in the Kansas for the entire second half, shot five of 20, 25 percent, one of seven from three point range. They had just two offensive rebounds too. So you're not even getting like a bunch of rebounds while they're getting those extra possessions at their end. A stat of the game here has to be either the second half rebounding. I mean, again, I mentioned Yukon eight defense or eight offensive rebounds in the second half Kansas, eight defensive rebounds in the second half. That kind of swung the game for Yukon who was down and was able to get those extra

Starting point is 00:14:45 possessions, extra shots, and they were able to take advantage, right? It wasn't a great shooting game for Yukon either, but you end up launching up eight more threes, you end up launching up six more field goal attempts in total, and that ends up being the difference in a five-point game. I think you could probably also say the second half shooting in general. I mean, Yukon at 44.8%. That's a solid number, especially against a good defense like Kansas. Kansas is 25%.

Starting point is 00:15:09 That is obviously a pretty huge difference there. Our awards here, the token white guy going off on KU Award, Braylen Mollens, it was meant to be. Braylon is a really good player. He's a top 20 recruit in the country, obviously. Still, at the same point in time, he was excellent tonight for Yukon, right? And it's not like he had been, I mean, there was one other game for him. He made his debut against Illinois.

Starting point is 00:15:36 He scored two points, had two rebounds on one of five and ten minutes. So it was meant to be that he was going to have his breakout of Kansas. Always happens for the token white guy against Kansas. And then the night and day award will be to the KU Biggs defensively. This was one positive for me. I noticed at one point, this was a possession in the early second half, just to finish with a little bit of a positive sprinkle here. where it's just night and day from maybe, you know, the last couple of years for KU.

Starting point is 00:16:03 So Alex Caraban catches it from three-point range, who he came in shooting 50% from three. He's a really good player for Yukon. And Florey ends up having to chase him off the three-point line, but he also stays in front of him. So Caraband can't get by him. Having your center be able to do that. And then it gets passed to one of their small guards who's got Tiller switching on to him. And he can't get by Tiller and he travels. And basically that was two big men for KU switched on to, you know, guards or in Carabans case,

Starting point is 00:16:33 forward that were able to guard the three-point line, stay in front of their guy, and force a turnover, essentially. And so the just night and day of having the ability of bigs who can get out is what makes Kansas such a dangerous defense for some of these really good offenses like Yukon, who, you know, is going to be putting up big point totals in a lot of games they play. this year. Like this is a Yukon offense who typically under Dan Hurley finishes as one of the best offenses in the country. Like last year, they were 15th year before that. They were first. Year before that, there were third. Year before that, 22nd, 27th year before. So far this year, they're 17th. And that's even with them, you know, shooting 34% from three, which I think that number is going to rise as the season goes on. So point being, I just at least thought that was kind of a small little

Starting point is 00:17:20 note and take away about what makes this Kansas defense or what helps make this Kansas defense so strong so far this season. All right, let's finish up with game balls. What's next for KU? Thanks for joining us again on Locked on Jayhawks again. No Darren Peterson in this one for KU and you certainly missed him in this game. So I think the question becomes will he play in the Missouri game, which is what's next for KU? Before we get to that, though, let's give out our game balls here. So I know it didn't go well for KU, but our offensive game ball, does it even feel right to give out an offensive game ball in a game like this. So Melvin Council actually led Kansas 12 points, but just four of 13 from the field

Starting point is 00:18:02 continues to be a first half versus second half guy. I guess two of seven versus two of six, not that different. But he also had four free throw attempts in the second half, didn't in the first half. So counsel, again, just by points would be in the discussion. He also had three assists, though we did have three turnovers, which is a high game for him. you could go with Florey by Evan 11 tied for second on the team. He didn't have any turnovers to, so that's helpful. But it wasn't a great offensive game for Florey.

Starting point is 00:18:33 And this was kind of a game where when you're facing Eric Ryba, who's a good player, but he's a freshman. This is one that you were hoping Florey was going to come in and kind of dominate with Taras readout. And that didn't really exactly happen. Now, Flore getting the five offensive rebounds was helpful for your offense, especially when you had more than half of the output for you. So I guess he's in discussion. And I am going to go on Marco Jackson, the 11 points, the lift off the bench, getting the crowd going in the

Starting point is 00:18:58 first half for KU, and continuing that in the second half, right? He had the big and one, which obviously the free throw was no good at the end, that, you know, got you back within one possession before you got to stop and then got the ball back with an opportunity to, you know, at least tie the game and it didn't work out with Tamara McDowell. But I thought, oh, Marco, I appreciated the aggressiveness to keep shooting, the aggressiveness to drive, things that we've wondered before. And so we'll give the offensive game ball to Marco Jackson. Again, not a lot of great candidates, though, on that one.

Starting point is 00:19:26 Defensive game ball in this one, so you get two steals from Melvin Council. You get a couple blocks from Trey White, two from Florida Bidunga, one from Bryson Tiller. You also get a steal from Jamari McDowell and Jaden Dawson. Now, when I look at Yukon, Silas Damari had just two points in this game. he came in averaging you know double figures um i i'm tempted to take the problem is that makes this difficult to be like okay this guy got locked down like melvin council was on him a bit and jemarri mcdowell's on him a bit can you switches so much that it's not exactly easy to say oh this guy just locked down this other guy um so i don't know i i guess we'll give it to uh i'm

Starting point is 00:20:16 going to give it to Jamarie McDowell. McDowell finishing with the one steal. Again, he was part of Damari kind of being down. And there were times where McDowell had to switch on to Eric Ryba. I think there's once or twice where Ryba scored over him, but I think he even got a stop or two on him as well. So I'm going to go with McDowell. And McDowell deserves credit as well because just going back to the Tennessee game,

Starting point is 00:20:40 he was the main one drawing Jacoby Gillespie. There were times where it was counsel. There was times where again, KU switches and its other players. But the main priority for counsel was Guarding Jacoby Gillespie, who was what if it was at like 519. So we'll give McDowell the defensive

Starting point is 00:20:55 game ball here. The overall game ball for KU, I guess we still will go with Flory Budunga, 11 points, 12 rebounds, double, two blocks, no turnovers, played 37 minutes, had four fouls, so kind of was able to deal with that. And again, you wanted him to kind of dominate. It wasn't that. You wanted more offensively, but in the

Starting point is 00:21:13 other areas, he did kind of dominate. And he did have some of those big rebounds when you were struggling to do it at least late in the game. He just needed more help, I think, on the glass in this game. Like he got 12 rebounds. Trey White got seven, but nobody else on the team got more than four. And I think that's where, okay, you'd like to see Tiller grab a couple extra rebounds more than four in the 29 minutes. That's where, you know, Col Rosario not being in the Billself trust tree right now,

Starting point is 00:21:37 he's supposed to be a good rebounder on the outside. That hurts you not having him. Darren Peterson, who would be a bigger guard, it hurts you not having him on the glass. So I guess overall we'll give to Florey. So what is next for KU? We mentioned Missouri on Sunday. It's a noon game over a T-Mobile Center. Will Darren Peterson be back?

Starting point is 00:21:53 That's kind of the big question now. And I think it becomes more dire after seeing a performance like this. After seeing the second half that you put up against Yukon offensively, it really becomes, oh, you need him back. Now, that doesn't mean that should influence your decision. If playing him on Sunday increases the risk of a re-injury, then he's not ready to come back yet. But I'll say this.

Starting point is 00:22:16 If we don't see him back in this game or the NC State game, I'm just going to kind of assume you're not going to see him back until Big 12 play. And that would kind of make more sense because if he's not going to play in these next two games, then you have Towson and Davidson after that. So like, okay, might as well just not play him for then. And then that gives you even more time off for the start of Big 12 play. The good thing is if Peterson can go on Sunday against Missouri, he'll have a lot of time between games, right?

Starting point is 00:22:42 You play Missouri on Sunday. then it's not till the following Saturday. You don't have another midway game. Not until the following Saturday, you'd be playing NC State. Then you would have that kind of shorter turnaround with the week game, but then you're getting closer when it break. You have some extra days off, then you have a longer time to pick to a whole play.

Starting point is 00:22:59 So I don't exactly know what's going on. It feels like there's a lot of rumors flying around. There's a lot of hearsay, which I think some of it is probably people just getting frustrated at this point in time. I still do believe we're going to see Darren Peterson again for KU in a basketball game. And I'm excited for that. moment. I'm hoping it's happening this Sunday against Missouri, but I'm also not going to expect it at this point because this whole thing has been very weird. It's been very reminiscent of,

Starting point is 00:23:22 remember like the Eric Berry injury where he was just like, oh, he's day to day, today. Oh, he's day today. He's day to day. I don't know. That might be if you're the younger part of the audience, like you might not remember. Just go look up like Eric Barry day to day. And he was day to day for like a full season. So I don't know. There's a rosy thought to finish out the episode. Anyway, that'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We'll be back at you to talk. a little KU football of a KU Missouri preview later in the week as well. This has been L.O.J. Thank you for joining us anywhere you get your podcast, including on YouTube.

Starting point is 00:23:51 See you next time.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - MISSING DARRYN PETERSON: Offense, Rebounding COLLAPSE vs UConn | Kansas Jayhawks Fall to Huskies

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