What Bill Self recalls about ugly final minute vs. Baylor ahead of Saturday’s rematch
Baylor’s men’s basketball team tied a season-high with 21 turnovers in the Bears’ 64-61 loss to Kansas three weeks ago at Allen Fieldhouse.
That’s the most turnovers the Jayhawks have forced in a game all season. In the Big 12 the next highest total of opponent TOs has been 16 both in a home win over Cincinnati and overtime road loss to Kansas State.
“I think we defended well the first time. They are hard to guard,” KU coach Bill Self said of the No. 15-ranked Bears, who take a 20-8 record, 9-6 in the Big 12, into Saturday’s noon rematch against the No. 7 Jayhawks (21-7, 9-6) at 7,500-seat Foster Pavilion in Waco, Texas.
“They can put four shooters around a rim-runner. Those are the hardest teams to guard, when you can put shooters around ball-screen options. Our activity was pretty good and ball-screen coverage pretty good. They didn’t shoot it great. They helped us some with some unforced turnovers,” Self added.
Baylor which had 21 turnovers in one other game — an 88-64 loss to Michigan State on Dec. 16 — committed 20 turnovers in a league victory over Iowa State.
The four shooters Self mentioned are guards Ja’Kobe Walter (14.8 ppg), RayJ Dennis (13.3 ppg), Jayden Nunn (10.6 ppg) and reserve Langston Love (11.1 ppg). Starting forward Jalen Bridges contributes 11.3 points and 5.3 boards. Big man Yves Missi averages 11.0 points and 5.6 boards.
Nunn and Walter each missed 3s (Nunn with seven seconds left and Walter at the buzzer) that could have forced overtime in Lawrence. The Jayhawks had led by five with 1:37 left and by as many as 11 with 6:30 to play.
KU’s Nick Timberlake had a rough go of it late. He had a turnover with 13 seconds remaining and missed the front end of a one-and-one with five seconds to play.
The Jayhawks did hang on and now hope to finish better if they happen to lead down the stretch in Waco against a team that is 13-2 at home this season.
“It seemed like two hours,” Self said of the final minute of that first meeting. “I actually think we probably learned without having to be taught a real hard lesson, which is good because they didn’t make shots on the other end. That was handled poorly by everybody including the coaches. If we are that situation again we certainly have to be better. I think (Timberlake will) be better in that situation if in it again.”
The Bears are coming off a 62-54 road win against TCU in which the Bears, who played man-to-man defense against KU all but three possessions, went zone the entire game against the Horned Frogs.
The Jayhawks are coming off Tuesday’s 76-68 loss to BYU in Allen Fieldhouse. Overall KU is 3-3 in its last six games and 6-5 in the last 11. KU is 2-5 on the road in league play.
“We didn’t play well against BYU. After I watched tape, we were not as bad as I thought we were,” Self said.
BYU cashed 13 threes to KU’s three. Also the Jayhawks went a chilly 19-of-31 from the line.
“It wasn’t far off but not good enough. We didn’t do enough stuff to make them play poorly because we didn’t do the simple things we normally do,” Self said.
KU senior Parker Braun said Self informed the team, “It’s just being better, not letting games slip away from us like that. Basketball is a game of runs, so when things aren’t going our way we’ve got to do a better job of correcting that and getting the momentum back on our end.
“He’s preached to us that stuff doesn’t happen in this building (Allen Fieldhouse where KU is 313-18 in Self’s 21 years at KU). We’ve got a lot of new guys. Maybe that’s something we kind of took for granted. Losses like that aren’t really tolerated around here. Just making sure we get better every day and kind of chip away on it and be the best team we can moving forward.”
KU will meet Kansas State at 8 p.m. Tuesday at Allen, then conclude the regular season at Houston on March 9 in a 3 p.m. tip.
