Late scoring drought dooms Kansas State’s upset bid against rival KU Jayhawks
For a few hours, it was impossible to tell that Kansas State was in the middle of a disappointing basketball season on Saturday at Bramlage Coliseum.
A hyped crowd jumped with enthusiasm at opening tip and then roared as the Wildcats took an early second-half lead over Kansas. They say you can throw the records out the window whenever rivals meet on the basketball court, and that was certainly the case for this edition of the Sunflower Showdown.
K-State played its best all-around game in weeks and showed the type of energy and fight it has in recent years, when its record was far better than it is now. But none of that was enough for victory. As much as things changed for the Wildcats against the Jayhawks, the outcome stayed the same.
No. 1 ranked Kansas won 62-58, sending K-State to its ninth straight defeat.
“We were ready to play,” K-State basketball coach Bruce Weber said. “The energy in the building helped us play with confidence. We played hard.”
They also played well for much of the game. When Makol Mawien made a layup in the paint on the first possession of the second half, it gave the Wildcats their first second-half lead in four games. They trailed by 19 in their last home game against Texas and then by 26 at halftime during their last game at Baylor.
Things were different for this one.
But the vibe inside the Octagon of Doom began to change during the final eight minutes. The home fans were anticipating an upset victory against the nation’s top-ranked team when the score was tied 48-48 with 7:57 remaining.
But then the Jayhawks (26-3, 15-1 Big 12) reeled off eight straight points to take control of a game that propelled them past Baylor, which lost on Saturday at TCU, in the conference standings.
The Wildcats (9-20, 2-14) simply didn’t have enough offense to keep up.
“We probably didn’t have enough offensive weapons in gut-check time,” Weber said. “They made all the plays.”
That has been their biggest weakness all season, and it once again held them back in this game. Had anyone on K-State’s roster heated up down the stretch, the Wildcats might have pulled out a memorable victory. Instead, everyone on the floor went cold and K-State entered a scoreless drought of 5 minutes, 27 seconds.
By the time Cartier Diarra ended the Jayhawks’ 8-0 run with a driving layup at the 2:30 mark of the second half, the game was all but over.
“We just needed somebody else to step up and make a shot and make a play,” Bruce Weber said. “Credit to them. They are very good defensively. Since they went small ball, they are very good defensively.”
The biggest difference in this game was Devon Dotson. Kansas had a player take over on his way to 25 points. K-State did not.
The Wildcats tried to answer with a balanced scoring attack that saw Diarra lead the team with 15 points and both Mawien and Xavier Sneed had 13 points.
That might have been enough to beat most teams on the schedule, and Sneed knew it. This game left him thinking about two words: What if?
Maybe they would be fighting for a postseason tournament instead of flirting with the most losses in school history.
“Coming off fighting the No. 1 team in the nation, we just have to keep that same mentality going into practice,” Sneed said. “I feel like we had a great week of practice as well. So if we keep that going we will be doing much better.”
This story was originally published February 29, 2020 at 3:44 PM.