K-State takeaways: When Barry Brown and Dean Wade score like this, watch out

The Kansas State Wildcats thumped the Oklahoma Sooners 74-61 on Wednesday at Lloyd Noble Center.

After a dismal start to conference play, Bruce Weber’s team is now riding high with back-to-back road wins over ranked teams.

K-State (13-4, 3-2 Big 12) is in third place in the Big 12 standings, while the Sooners (13-4, 2-3) are the ones suddenly searching for answers.

Here are some thoughts from the game:

When Brown and Wade play like this, watch out

K-State began the season ranked No. 12 mostly because it returned two of the best seniors in the Big 12.

Dean Wade was the conference’s preseason player of the year. Barry Brown was his sidekick, picked to earn all-conference honors.

Much was expected out of both star players, and, for that reason, much was expected from K-State.

This was a reminder of what they are capable of.

Brown continued his recent scoring surge and eclipsed 20 points for the third straight game. He finished with 25 points on 19 shots. He was sharp from the outside, hitting three three-pointers, and effective within the arc. Add on five assists, and this was arguably his top performance of the season.

Of course, it was easy for him to look for teammates when he had Wade open on the wing. Wade looked at full strength and scored a season-high 20 points on 14 shots.

They were a dynamic duo for the first time all season. That much was obvious late in the second half when Brown sent a pass to Wade on the right wing and Wade swished the open three-pointer. Brown created space for his teammate and Wade took advantage. After the points went on the scoreboard, they pointed at each and nodded their heads.

“That is how they play,” K-State guard Kamau Stokes said. “When they get going it is tough to stop. That makes the game open up more, because then everyone is keying in on them. The way they were scoring, today that opened up a lot of things for us in the second half.”

Weber said they had a positive impact on “everything.”

“They are seniors,” Weber said. “They have been through it. They make you good coaches. They know what to look for.”

It hasn’t been the smoothest of seasons for Brown and Wade. Brown has struggled on the offensive end in several games and Wade has been out with a foot injury. But now that Brown has found his rhythm and Wade is healthy good things are happening.

K-State, once thought to be among the worst scoring teams in the Big 12, has topped 70 points in two of the past three games.

Another win like this against TCU on Saturday and K-State may jump back into the national polls.

“It feels good,” Wade said. “We are making shots and being aggressive. We are just flowing with the basketball. Everyone had energy tonight. It was an all-around fun game.”

Another level

Talk about an encore.

Brown followed up his big games against West Virginia (29 points) and Iowa State (23) with another strong outing against Oklahoma (25).

That couldn’t have been easy considering how well Oklahoma has played on defense this season, and how prominently the Sooners focused on Brown in this game. Brown is the reigning Big 12 Player of the Week and stopping him was Lon Kruger’s top priority.

But it didn’t matter. Brown mixed up his game and scored from all over, hitting shots from the outside and mid-range. Instead of driving to the basket with reckless abandon, as he has in recent games, he dished out five assists and took open shots when they were there.

He scored 25 points without attempting a single free throw.

“It was nothing that we didn’t already know,” Brown said of the extra defensive attention. “They did a lot of switching on ball screens. They did the things Oklahoma does. It was kind of similar to what we saw last year. But there was more intensity when they did it.”

Teams will no doubt continue to try and take away Brown like the elite scorer he is becoming, but he appears ready for the challenge.

Road warriors

Lloyd Noble Center has been a place of horrors for the Wildcats in recent years, with Oklahoma winning by huge margins here in each of the past three seasons.

That’s the type of thing that could mentally scar a group of seniors like Brown, Stokes and Wade, but it seemed to galvanize them on Wednesday. K-State never trailed and dominated in a difficult road venue. That alone was impressive. Pair it with K-State’s road win at Iowa State over the weekend and the Wildcats are starting to look road warriors.

“This was our first time winning here,” Stokes said. “We have got some things on our bucket list that we talked about accomplishing at the beginning of the year, and winning here was one of them. These road wins are big, real big.”

They are also hard to come by.

Few, if any, other teams will win at both Oklahoma and Iowa State this season. K-State did, and it’s now back in the Big 12 race after an 0-2 start to league play.

This story was originally published January 16, 2019 at 9:35 PM.