K-State Report: Wildcats embraced late push from Wake Forest

D.J. Johnson wasn’t worried when Wake Forest pulled within one point of Kansas State in the second half on Tuesday at Dayton Arena.

He actually smiled when the game got close, before the Wildcats pulled away for a 95-88 victory.

“We just had to out-tough them the last few minutes,” Johnson said. “I knew that wasn’t going to be a problem.”

That may come as a surprise to some, as the Wildcats haven’t exactly been the best at protecting leads this season. Just last week, they appeared on their way to victory against West Virginia in the Big 12 Tournament, but squandered a double-digit advantage and lost by one.

But Johnson only remembers the close games K-State won, such as two narrow victories over Baylor.

“I hope and pray that we get a lot more close games in this tournament,” Johnson said. “I want it to come to the final minutes, because we are battle tested. We beat Baylor on the road, we beat West Virginia at home. We have won lots of games like that.”

It wasn’t nerves

Sophomore guard Kamau Stokes had several costly giveaways early on against Wake Forest. He dropped a rebound out of bounds, lost control of the ball on a fastbreak and threw passes to the wrong team on his way to five turnovers.

He settled down in the second half and made five three-pointers and scored 22 points. So his early errors had to be from nevers associated with playing in his first NCAA Tournament game, right?

“I wasn’t nervous at all,” Stokes said. “I’m never nervous for any game.”

Still, K-State basketball coach Bruce Weber had to pull him out of the game and try to settle him down. Then he had a private conversation with him in the locker room at halftime.

“I just had to bounce back from it,” Stokes said. “Things happen. You always have an opportunity to bounce back and do something with it. That’s what I did.”

Point center

Senior guard Carlbe Ervin is a point guard, but he sometimes fills up the stat sheet like a center.

That was certainly the case against Wake Forest. Ervin found space inside and scored seven points and grabbed four rebounds. He also provided leadership off the bench, providing a calming presence to teammates when foul trouble caught up with starters in the first half.

Containing Collins

Wake Forest star forward John Collins had 26 points and nine rebounds against Kansas State, so it’s difficult to praise the Wildcats for their defense against him.

But they did slow him down at times, using a mixture of defenders including Wesley Iwundu, Dean Wade, Isaiah Maurice and Johnson.

“They were definitely making a concerted effort to try to deny me the ball, try to force me to catch the ball as far away fromt he post as possible,” Collins said. “Obviously, we got soem chances int he second half, but it was definitely an effor on their end to deny me the ball.”

On to Sacramento

K-State will depart Dayton for Sacramento on a chartered flight at 8:30 a.m. central time on Wednesday.

In the past, play-in winners have played their first round game two days later. But K-State will get two days off before returning to action on the West Coast.

K-State Mentality

Nike supplied K-State players with new pre-game shirts on Tuesday. They read “K-State Mentality.” Wake Forest, another Nike school, wore similar shirts that read “Wake Forest Mentality.”

One noticeable addition to the new shirts: they all featured the popular fan slogan “EMAW” on the sleeves, which K-State had gone away from in recent years under former athletic director John Currie.

This story was originally published March 15, 2017 at 12:50 AM with the headline "K-State Report: Wildcats embraced late push from Wake Forest."