Tag: college sports (Page 8 of 41)

I admit I was dreading Monday’s KU-Texas game.

Normally, coming off a terrible loss like Iowa State’s destruction of the Jayhawks Saturday, I would be fired up for a Big Monday home game. It would be a chance to wash away the bad taste of the loss with a big, loud crowd and a W.

But I also watched a big chunk of the second half of the Longhorns’ come-from-behind win at Kansas State over the weekend. That got me super worried.[1]

Texas is long, athletic, and tough. Like they usually are. But they play with a confidence and swagger I hadn’t seen in a Texas team in years. I could tell from their body language that they were going to win, no matter what K-State did.

I figured the combination of a team that is a bad physical matchup for KU and also the hottest team in the conference with a KU team that is injured both physically and psychologically would equal a Longhorns win and end to KU’s Big 12 title hopes.

Thus I was both surprised and pleased that KU jumped out to a quick lead, weathered multiple Texas runs, and eventually won by eight.

There was a lot to be happy about. KU scored 88 points despite only hitting two 3 pointers and with the Big 12’s leading scorer only scoring two points. Joseph Yesufu finally had a game where he contributed enough that you wanted him on the court. Ernest Udeh continued his growth. Gradey Dick is still struggling to get open from behind the arc, but battled to tally a team-high 21 points. The Jayhawks out-rebounded the bigger Longhorns.

Perhaps most importantly DaJuan Harris was turned up, or turnt up as the kids say, from the beginning. He’s generally pretty steady in demeanor. Lately he had seemed low energy. I still think that knock to the head he took three weeks ago had some long term effects. Anyway, last night he was as fired up as I’ve seen him, and from the jump. He was a demon on defense and hit some huge shots late.

Oh, and he threw this ridiculous pass.

Joe brought the house down last night 💪@Gatorade Play of the Game from the 88-80 win over Texas: pic.twitter.com/xIsRl3zaXY

— Kansas Jayhawks (@KUAthletics) February 7, 2023

It was a very good team performance on a night when Jalen Wilson was totally shut down. Anything less would have ended with a loss.

The stats ESPN flashed after the game were staggering. Bill Self is now 36–0 in Big Monday home games. He is also 11–1 against top 5 opponents at home, the highest win percentage in the history of the game.[2]

I told some friends yesterday that this felt like one of those games that would require Self to find the right strings to pull and the right mental buttons to push to get a wounded team focused and able to win. It reminded me of the Baylor game two years ago, when a mercurial KU team ended the Bears’ hopes for an undefeated season. Or the Texas game back in 2016 when Cliff Alexander had just been suspended and Perry Ellis was injured, yet KU hammered a Longhorns squad that had three seven footers.

I think Self did do some smart things sticking with a small team late that put Texas’ bigs in bad spots defensively. But that was more a function of his guards playing well than something strategically brilliant Self did.

It was mostly Harris being aggressive and finishing. Kevin McCullar looking to get to the rim instead of bricking 3’s. And the bench turning in their best collective game of the year.

Ah, the bench. That was huge. Yesufu has maddened KU fans since he arrived because we all saw his highlight reels from his years at Drake, and he’s never played anything like that at KU. Even when he had a chance to show his raw physical gifts he looked like he was wearing a weight vest. Last night he was 5–9 from the field with five rebounds and zero turnovers. He still mixed in a dumb play or two, but he was a huge positive.

I wondered if MJ Rice would ever play again after he failed to get back on an Iowa State break Saturday and gave up two offensive rebounds and a basket on the play when Zach Clemence may have destroyed his knee to try to stop one of those layups. Rice wasn’t great last night, but at least he could stay on the court for more than 30 seconds at a time. If the ESPN box score is right, he played 15 minutes, which has to be the most for him in a conference game.

With Clemence out, Bobby Pettiford injured again, and Zuby Ejiofor unable to play for a few more weeks, it was imperative that Yesefu, Udeh, and Rice be, at worst, net neutrals in the minutes they got. They each contributed big time to the dub.

It was kind of fun to see some bad blood developing late in the game. Timmy Allen never stops talking and does his best to get under everyone’s skin. He and Jalen Wilson had to be separated after Allen drew Wilson’s fourth foul on a charge. Gradey Dick and Sir’Jabari Rice had words late, and then Tyrese Hunter got involved. It would benefit everyone if the season finale between these teams in Austin was the deciding game for the Big 12.

I also loved that, after the ESPN sideline reporter shared that Allen told his teammates in a late-game huddle that they just needed two stops and two buckets and they would win because “(KU) will fall apart,” Harris immediately scored and then Allen missed two straight and KU was suddenly ahead by 10 again.

KU went through the toughest stretch of their schedule 4–4. When it began I told friends I would be thrilled with 5–3. There was a one-point loss in overtime in Manhattan in there, so I’m calling it a success. Still that one game could be the difference if Texas, Baylor, Iowa State, or KSU don’t mix in a 4–4 stretch of their own.

And KU can’t fuck it up by going 0–2 in Oklahoma next week. Even though those are road games, losing both would be a killer.

As the Big 12 title seems like a bit of a stretch at the moment, my hope for February is that KU can get, and stay, healthy; keep developing the bench; and find a way to get Gradey Dick more open looks from deep. He hasn’t shot poorly from a mechanical standpoint. To my eye his shot has gotten a little quick, but his core mechanics still look good. Many of his misses at Iowa State were in-and-out, so more luck than anything else. Still, you want a guy feeling comfortable so when he does get looks he’s just relaxing and firing instead of having that mental pressure of “I better hit this because I may not get another chance for 10 minutes.”

I think a lot of KU’s issues right now are more because the Big 12 is so strong and knows them so well. Get to March healthy and there’s no reason to think they can’t beat just about anyone they play. They are also so reliant on two guys offensively, struggle to guard at a couple spots, and lacking in size that they will be vulnerable in every NCAA game they play.

That’s looking too far ahead. I’m going to enjoy the Texas win for the next four days.

Rock Chalk, bitches.

Perhaps THE thing that has set Kansas apart and made their Big 12 success so consistent in the Bill Self era is their ability to avoid losing streaks. Lose one? They almost always win the next. On the rare occasions they lose back-to-back games, a win in the third is about as easy money as you can find. There might be momentary panic among the fanbase after a loss. But normally that is quickly quashed.

Today, though? I’m not so sure.

Suddenly the Jayhawks are in the midst of a three-game losing streak, with no easy wins in sight.

Jalen Wilson has been fantastic, on as hot of a streak as any KU player since at least Paul Pierce in 1998 if not Danny Manning in 1988, averaging a hair over 30 ppg over the last week. I’m wondering, though, if that’s kind of the plan against KU: let J-Will get his and make sure no one else goes off.

If so, it has worked pretty well.

Since halftime of the game in Manhattan, it’s as though KJ Adams suddenly remembered that he is KJ Adams and has kind of stunk. Kevin McCullar has looked thoroughly shook. Although he had 14 points and 12 rebounds last night, he still had some really bad moments.

We saw signs of life from Gradey Dick. He was only 2–5 from 3, but he was finally aggressive in getting to the rim again and dropped a game-high 24. If he can get people to even halfway respect his shot fakes and drives, that should give him space to get a couple more good looks per game. Which opens things up for his teammates.

DaJuan Harris? Yikes. He hasn’t been the same since he smacked his head on the Bramlage Coliseum floor. He somehow was only charged with four turnovers last night, but it seemed like more. Several of those were just bad decisions/plays, not the product of good Baylor defense. He’s not getting to the rim as often, either, and when he does he seems more interested in passing out than trying to get a shot off or seek a foul. He went through a phase like this last year, but that was more survivable since he was surrounded with better, or more consistent at least, scorers. There’s less room for error this year, especially from him.

Monday night in Waco was frustrating because KU did a lot wrong, and still did enough right to make two big runs in the second half, briefly taking the lead midway through. But in each of those moments, it was little mistakes by KU that gave Baylor back the momentum. Bad passes. The inability to hold onto a ball that hit them in the hands. Getting beat and being forced to foul on drives. All little things that add up quickly on the road against a very good team.

My random, postgame, half-assed theory is that KJ Adams’ development in December may have actually hurt the Jayhawks long term. He was great for 5–6 weeks, meaning Self had no reason to give any of the other bigs meaningful minutes. Zuby Ejiofor and Ernest Udeh might get a look here and there, but as soon as they missed a defensive rotation or blew up a play on offense, Self would sit them down.

Now, when defenses are taking away what made KJ successful during that stretch, his lack of size becomes a real problem. But Self doesn’t trust Ejiofor or Udeh to come in for more than spot duty. KU really needed a longer player on the court in each of the three losses. Had those freshmen played more minutes in December, would Self have the trust to play them more now?

The answer to that question is always “Well, he sees them in practice and we don’t, and they obviously aren’t doing enough there to warrant the minutes.” I just wish Zuby and/or Ernest did enough of something – rebounding, blocking shots, playing solid D – to get on the court for 5–10 minutes a night and force teams to deal with their size.

Of course the real source of angst among KU fans isn’t losing at Baylor. It’s getting waxed at home by TCU Saturday. I kind of saw that coming – I warned you that TCU was the worst matchup in the league for KU because of their size and speed – but I did not expect such a thorough ass kicking. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen an opposing team go on a 19–0 run in Allen Fieldhouse before.

In my personal preseason rankings, I had KU third in the Big 12, behind Texas and Baylor. Baylor and KU have both suffered through three-game losing streaks. TCU lost three of four. The league is so tough there’s no reason to think that the other contenders won’t go through similar spells. The Ken Pomeroy prediction for the Big 12 currently has a four-way tie for first at 11–7 with two teams at 10–8. The challenge for KU is can they get their issues figured out so they can stay in that top six.

I’m not the first person to think about this, but over the past week I’ve been considering losing streaks in the era of NIL. What happens when a kid who is making money to play in college isn’t performing well, or his team is losing, or he’s just sick of his coach’s BS? Are they more likely to look for their own at the expense of the team, to mentally check out, or even flat-out quit? I think most kids who earn a big NIL deal have enough built-in pride where that won’t be a factor. But I hate how that’s in my mind now.

Indiana’s Trayce Jackson-Davis shared a message he received from a “fan” a couple weeks back, calling him out for his play and using NIL as a specific argument for how he didn’t stack up to the legends of IU who came before him. I doubt he is the only one getting those messages.

Players like Jackson-Davis, who is making well into six figures this season, don’t deserve pity. However, when they have track records of playing hard, they also don’t deserve to have their motivation questioned when they go through a cold spell.

Every January KU goes through a rough stretch. Now it isn’t always losing three (or more) straight, obviously. But it is a rite of passage this time of year for KU fans to rip on the team, bemoan the recruits we missed out on, and start wondering about who will fill those holes for next season. Bill Self usually figures out a way to get KU right again. The path is certainly tougher this year.

A week ago some KU fans[1] were suggesting this year’s squad was/could be better than last season’s national champs. Now I think most of us are wondering if they aren’t more analogous to the 2020–21 team. That team also had a three-game losing streak and ended the year getting humbled by USC in the round of 32.[2] At least for today that seems like an apt comparison.

Well, KU’s end-game luck had to run out eventually. After winning 15-straight games that were decided by less than 10 points, KU came up a point short in overtime in Manhattan Tuesday night.

KU missed 10 free throws and 23 3-pointers. They had the ball at the end of regulation and overtime and didn’t get a shot off either time. They had the ball at the end of the first half and a chance to run out the clock. Instead Gradey Dick drove into traffic, was fouled, and hit one of two free throws. Seconds later Keyontae Johnson hit a short jumper at the buzzer to put the Wildcats up by five at the half.

The Jayhawks still only lost by one on the road to a top 15 team. With three starters fouled out and another (possibly) playing concussed.

It takes a lot to kill this KU squad.

The only true bad luck of the night was Bill Self calling a timeout with about 40 seconds left in overtime, just before Jalen Wilson swished a 30-foot shot that would have put KU up four. After the timeout KU couldn’t get a shot off and the Wildcats hit the game-winner.

Sheesh.

That was, by almost every measure, a good loss. But it coming to the Purples makes it sting a lot more than it should, and makes the replaying of the dozens of little moments that cost KU a point or two even more bitter.

There’s also the specter of what lies ahead. Any loss in the Big 12 can quickly turn into a nasty losing streak. KU hosts TCU Saturday, probably the team they matchup with the worst in the conference. Then go to Baylor. Then to Kentucky. Then host K-State. Then go to Ames. Then host Texas. Shit can get sideways really fast, so every close loss seems even bigger than normal.

After the first few minutes, when he had his shot blocked at least three times, Wilson was fantastic. Had his late 3 counted, he would have tied Andrew Wiggins for the most points scored by a KU player under Self. He’s been super inefficient in recent weeks, but was nails last night. A W in Manhattan on his shot would have propelled him back into the national POY conversation.[1]

The rest of KU? Everyone had their struggles. Well, not KJ Adams, who was incredible during KU’s first-half comeback but disappeared in the second half.

DaJuan Harris had 11 assists but three terrible turnovers in crunch time. I really wondered if he was concussed after hitting his head on the floor. Maybe that explains that poor decision making late?

Gradey Dick had a horrible night shooting from behind the arc, going 1–8. That will happen. But, man, some of them were wiiiiiide open. He still managed to pitch in 16 points, grab seven rebounds, and get four steals and two blocks. K-State kept picking on him on defense, and he either got beat badly to give up layups or committed cheap fouls. I don’t know if he was ever going to hit another 3, but it sure would have been nice having him on the court instead of fouled out thanks to three soft fouls that came from being in bad position instead of making any real effort to stop his man.

Kevin McCullar had been poor for a couple weeks, but was flat-out bad Tuesday. I wondered if he was sick. He looked literally shaky. He nearly air-balled two free throws. He did airball a 3 and hit the side of the backboard with another. He seemed a step slow on defense. Hopefully he did just have a bug of some kind and can rebound Saturday.

I had to laugh when KC Star beat writer Shreyas Laddha Tweeted that he had never seen a team as good as KU miss as many layups as they do. If you didn’t know he was new to the KU beat, that would be an obvious tell. Seriously, KU misses a TON of shots right at the rim. At least three on the break last night, as guys got stuck between laying it up, dunking it, and worrying about the defense. Easy for me to say sitting on my 51-year-old ass in Indianapolis, but come on, fellas!

I’m guessing for a neutral this was a great game to watch. Well, except for the officiating, which was atrocious. Now, it was called pretty evenly. But it was as if the refs decided about 30 minutes in, “OK, this is a rivalry game, it’s close, we need to blow the whistle on every play.” KSU’s Johnson was called for two fouls when he was just in the vicinity of someone falling down. He was given an and-one, and fouled out McCullar in the process, when he flew by McCullar and Adams without being touched. Nae’Qwan Tomlin fouled out on a play when another K-State player clearly was the guilty party. Wilson had a clean steal in overtime that a ref decided he needed to blow the whistle on. He was also hammered on one drive, a shove from Tomlin nearly knocked him over, with no call. Two possessions later he flipped a runner at the rim with the mildest contact and drew a foul.

Oh, and worst call of the night was when they stopped play, with K-State driving to the hoop, because Wilson was cramping in the backcourt. Pretty much everyone in my various KU chats said “Oooh, that was a really bad call. And lucky for us!”

Those are just the examples that I can think of immediately. Worse than the bad/wrong calls were the sheer number of whistles. There were 49 fouls called in 45 minutes. The game was physical, but never egregious or nasty. It was just two really good teams battling. And the refs decided they needed to take it over. Even then they couldn’t do it with any consistency. Quite the commercial for the Big 12!

You always laugh when your rival hires a new coach and the fanbase gets irrationally excited about it. That’s a fundamental part of rivalries. “Oh, sure, Roy Williams is shaking in his shoes thinking about how to match wits with Jim Wooldridge.” So when K-State fans immediately suggested that hiring Jerome Tang would turn K-State into Baylor north, it was easy to be amused.

You can’t draw big conclusions from half a season, but Tang seems legit. Even assistants who have a good feel for the game can struggle when they have to be The Man. Tang doesn’t seem afraid of the moment and made some really nice calls last night. With Baylor not matching preseason expectations (yet), KU fans can turn this into another way to bash Scott Drew, suggesting Tang was the real brains in the operation down there.

So now KU is 5–1 in the conference, tied with K-State and Iowa State a third of the way through the schedule. I’m not sure anyone can make any safe assumptions about how the next third of the slate will go. Six games seems like an eternity when every night brings a physical matchup with another good to very good team. Just when you think you have confidence in any squad, they could easily go through an 0–2 week and prove that belief misguided.

Another nail biter for KU on Tuesday, an improbable four-point win over Oklahoma after trailing by ten (and looking dead) with about 5:00 left. KU went over 11 minutes without hitting a field goal. ELEVEN MINUTES! Oklahoma was loose and focused.

Then KU got a dunk. Followed by two offensive boards and a 3. Bill Self found a way to turn Oklahoma’s defensive strategy of face-guarding Gradey Dick against them and suddenly KU was scoring on every possession. It also helped that OU took three terrible shots as the Phog Allen pressure clearly got to them.

Through four conference games, KU has now come from double digits down twice, and were down by seven in another win. Heartburn city.

I had to laugh in the days between the games Saturday and Tuesday at how a few KU fans were saying this team was better than last year’s. That seemed a little premature, especially since West Virginia and Texas Tech might both stink. Tuesday’s performance showed that this year’s team has plenty of flaws that can be exposed.

In my view, last year’s team had a much higher ceiling because Ochai Agbaji could always go get a bucket and David McCormack could (generally) be relied on for getting at least a late-in-the-shotclock look near the basket.

Jalen Wilson, DaJuan Harris, and Kevin McCullar can all get to the hoop, but not as efficiently Ochai could. Where he could get past people and explode to the rim, each of this year’s trio need either an angle or open lane to reach the hoop. Jalen throws in some tough-ass shots, but since he might have a negative vertical he can’t always capitalize the way Ochai could.

This year KU has no true inside presence, although they are finding ways to get those looks as the season goes on.

Of course, last year’s team didn’t have Gradey Dick, maybe the best pure shooter Self has had. Tuesday Gradey showed that he is a freshman, as he struggled to get free from OU’s defense. Self will find some ways to manufacture more looks for him over the next few weeks. But, right now, Dick is not a player who can get himself free when he has the ball. To his credit, he has a very good hoops IQ and will usually move the ball or try to drive when he is covered. Being able to take those 2–3 hard dribbles and rise up is a skill I think he’ll add next year. Unfortunately he’ll be doing that in the NBA and not Lawrence.

I’ve been banging this drum for years, but it seems like the college basketball media is finally figuring out how good Self is at finding ways to get his teams easy chances to score. The Texas Tech and West Virginia games were perfect examples. Playing bigger, stronger teams, Self found ways to spread the court, invert the offense, and still get his players looks at the rim. It helped that KU started both games red-hot from behind the arc, which opens everything up.

Those shots were also there against Oklahoma; the Jayhawks just missed them. One reporter counted 19 misses at the rim. I added two more on bad offensive foul calls that took away baskets.

Bill Self does a lot of things really well. His greatest attribute, and the one that explains his success over his career, is how he always finds ways to generate easy shots. Whether it was high-low when he had multiple bigs, spreading the court in the years he had multiple shooters, the outside weave to create attacking lanes for players like Agbaji and Josh Jackson, or pick-and-roll with Devon Dotson/Marcus Garrett and Udoka Azubuike.

The last two years he’s opened up the offense, if not going totally “positionless,” at least going to a highly interchangeable look. DaJuan Harris is one of the most productive point guards in the country, yet he doesn’t dominate the ball because it is always moving and anyone who gets a rebound can bring it up the court.

Monday a reporter asked Self about his willingness to be flexible and he gave a fascinating answer. Without talking about causes (both changes in the game and pressures on recruiting because of the NCAA investigation), Self said he has completely changed how he recruits.

In the past they would look for guys that fit their system and particular roles. If a big man was leaving, he was looking for a 5-man. Wing rotation is thin? Find a couple new ones.

Now, though, he said he and his staff are more focused on seeing what they have and catering their offense around that combination of skills. In general, he wants athletes that can shoot. But if that means he ends up with a bunch of 6’7” guys and no effective big man, they will find a way to make that work.

While that’s obvious to anyone who watches KU, it is also a pretty remarkable admission. A lot of coaches who have been around as long and had as much success as Self have a hard time moving away from the what made them successful. Bobby Knight might be the ultimate example. Yet Self has embraced the changes in the game and kept his teams rolling.

Let’s talk about KJ Adams for a minute. I’m not sure we’ve ever seen a total transformation of a player in such a short amount of time. Six weeks ago he barely took any shots, and generally missed them if they weren’t dunks. He was a terrible free throw shooter. He seemed to just be occupying the 5 spot until one of his taller teammates earned enough of Self’s trust to take over the job.

As we move into mid-January and the heart of the conference season, he has scored in double figures nine straight times. Since November 28 he’s shooting 85% from the line. He’s still not a great defensive rebounder, but as Self also said this week, he’s often keeping the opponent’s best big man off the boards, allowing Wilson, McCullar, and Dick to clean up.

Last season someone Tweeted after KJ had a nice few minutes something along the lines of “Wait for it, DaJuan Harris and KJ Adams are going to start every game for the next three years because Bill Self is in love with them.” This person was kind of joking, and the implication was that KU would basically be playing 3 on 5 on offense because neither player really looked to score.

Today it would surprise me more if KJ wasn’t a starter as long as he is in Lawrence. Just an amazing change in fortunes.

I also must share that I’ve been pretty laid back through these opening Big 12 games. Sure, I was yelling a lot in the Oklahoma State game, caught up in the emotion of that comeback.

But Tuesday I was pretty resigned to losing. I wasn’t pissed, as in “FUCK, how are we losing?!?!” the way I would have been in the past. It was more of a “Fuck, I can’t believe we are losing.” Winning the national championship has changed my stress level significantly. At least for now.

UConn Women

I took L and her best friend to meet some of their travel teammates at Hinkle Fieldhouse for the Butler-UConn women’s game last night. A lot of people had the same idea. I’m guessing this was Butler’s most-attended game of the year, with nearly 3,000 people showing up.

A good chunk of those in the house were high school and middle school players. They were packing the hallways before and after the game, mostly to get a look at injured UConn guard Paige Bueckers. We saw entire high school teams sitting together. There were more signs for Paige/the Huskies than for Butler. L and her teammates ran down to the tunnel that leads to the visitor’s locker room just before halftime. She was rewarded with a high five, that she got on video, as Bueckers walked by.

As for the game…whew. The Huskies jumped out to a quick, early lead. The Bulldogs hit a few 3’s in the second quarter to trim a 15-point deficit to five. That seemed to make UConn mad. They blitzed Butler for the next quarter-plus, getting the lead up to 30 early in the third quarter and holding it right around there the rest of the game.

It was amazing watching UConn play. Their bigs were all faster than Butler’s guards. They had 6’4”–6’5” girls getting deflections, racing to the loose ball, then leading the break, running past 5’7” Butler players on the way. Butler tried to get offense going but were constantly swamped by UConn’s size. There were a lot of forced shots at the end of the shot clock when three girls just refused to shoot and the fourth and to chuck it towards the rim. UConn even had a bunch of players in street clothes – they played just eight – and I know at least one of those ladies is a starter.

In addition to Bueckers not playing, the other bummer of the night was that Geno Auriemma also missed the game due to illness. I would have loved to watch his reaction when Butler made that little run in the second quarter. UConn seemed to do just fine without him, though.

L and her AAU teammates also saw the girl from their program who will be going to UConn next year. We wondered if she would be around since she left the suburban public school she grew up at for a prep school in northern Indiana this year. Must have been a break in their schedule to let her get back to Indy for the night.

Jayhawk Talk

Playing in Lubbock has become one of those games that gets elevated regardless of how good Texas Tech is. Granted, they’ve been really good for the past 5–6 years, which goes a long way towards making those games tough.

So last night’s KU win, which they thoroughly controlled for about 26 minutes before surviving the inevitable Tech rally, might seem a little bigger and more impressive than it actually is. I say that because I’m not sure how good this year’s Tech team is. This felt more like one of those old KU-Tech games where the Red Raiders hit a bunch of crazy shots to stay in it than one where it was a matchup of near equals. I know they’ve been fighting injuries and are working in some new players. But aside from Tech’s early and late runs, KU was clearly the better team.

Still, you never apologize for road wins during the conference season, and KU now has one out of the way that every other Big 12 contender will need to match.

I was looking at KU’s upcoming schedule yesterday and the strength of the Big 12 really hit home. Usually there’s a game or two in there where you think, “OK, that game is a break in the at K-State-Baylor-at Texas stretch,” or whatever. There was no game in the next few weeks where I got that feeling. That may change due to injuries or teams that seem tough now taking a few losses and falling apart. For the moment, though, it sure seems like every 3–4 days Big 12 fans are going to be wound up about the next high-stress game.

K-State-Texas

What the hell? This might be the most amazing score for a non-KU Big 12 game I’ve ever seen. I’m sure I’m not the only cynical, outside observer who assumes this will make Texas find a way to fix their Chris Beard problem really damn quickly.