‘Today was a long day’ KU’s Self says of practice, meeting after third straight loss
Kansas’ men’s basketball players were given the day off on Sunday — a day of rest following Saturday’s 75-68 loss to Oklahoma at Lloyd Noble Center in Norman, Oklahoma.
“The guys could watch football, which was good,” KU coach Bill Self said Monday of the Jayhawks viewing the Kansas City Chiefs’ AFC championship victory over Buffalo and/or Tampa Bay’s NFC title win over Green Bay.
“Today was a long day,” Self quickly added, commenting on an eventful Monday.
Self said the Jayhawks — who will take a three-game losing streak into Thursday’s 7 p.m. home contest against TCU — on Monday lifted weights, practiced and also had a team meeting attended by both players and coaches.
“Attitudes were great,” Self said on Monday’s Hawk Talk radio show. He indicated he was encouraged, “not because of a rah-rah type deal,” but because he was able to express some sentiments to his players, off to a 10-5 start, 4-4 in Big 12 play.
“I told the guys I am a little bit empathetic toward what they are dealing with,” Self said of life as a basketball player and student during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Though he stressed, “we can’t use that (pandemic) as an excuse; we won’t use that as an excuse,” Self expressed appreciation for the players’ sacrifices during a school year in which they can’t do much of anything except study, lift weights, practice and play games.
Campus has been basically deserted since Thanksgiving with the student population to return for the start of second-semester classes on Feb. 1.
“It sucks for everybody,” said Self, who said he wishes his players, “could go out and blow off some steam. They can’t. No teams in America can. I was thinking, ‘My guys are not very happy. They are not happy with themselves. They are not happy with each other. They are not happy with me.’
“All teams go through phases where things don’t go great. Believe it or not the Chiefs may not have been happy after the Raiders game. They’re really happy now. People go through stuff. You are down. You are depressed a little bit. You feel you are letting others down, which they (feel they) do,” he added.
Self said on Hawk Talk he told the players, “I think they’ve handled it great from a COVID standpoint, a protocol standpoint. There are things that magnify a situation to make it appear worse than it is,” he added of the current state of the team.
He reminded his players of the 1988 Jayhawks, who went from 12-8 and talking about a possible NIT bid to winning the NCAA crown. Also the last KU team that lost three straight games — Self’s 2012-13 squad — won 12 of 13 games down the stretch before losing to Michigan in the Sweet 16.
“We don’t play with the same energy I want them to. We don’t. We haven’t consistently all year,” Self said. “But think about it. Of the six newcomers we have how many have experienced the energy this place actually possesses (because of lack of fans in Allen for home games because of COVID)?”
While telling his players he and his assistants “need to give them more help,” he added, “we all have to figure this out. We can’t unless we are aligned. When we do that we’ll get better. It doesn’t mean we’ll be undefeated the rest of the way, but gives us a better chance.”
Self — he said he wants more “energy” from the team during practice and games — repeated his plan of possibly changing the starting lineup Thursday against TCU (9-5, 2-4). He started the evaluation process regarding the lineup during a scrimmage situation at practice Monday.
“I think certain guys really stepped up, certain guys maybe didn’t,” Self said of Monday’s practice, which included scrimmaging. “We definitely saw a difference in energy level. I definitely mixed the teams up. I will give everybody a chance to play with everybody and we’ll see where we need to go.”
Self without mentioning names said one team of five players dominated another group Monday.
“It was an onslaught,” Self said. “It was not all the starters (that dominated). It was the starters on both teams.”
He said the bottom line regarding the lineup for TCU is: “We’ll let it play out tomorrow. We’ll let it play out Thursday. I don’t know what I want to do. I know initially (after Saturday’s third loss in a row) I was, ‘We’ve got to shake it up.’ I (still) agree but are we better shaking it up if guys play to an energy level that is different than what they have been? Do we have to change personnel to do that? Whatever we need to do we are going to do it. I thought it was very interesting today.”
Self on Hawk Talk also repeated Saturday’s statement that the chances of the 2020-21 Jayhawks having a “storybook” season are over.
“That’s 97 percent of teams in America, what they deal with every year,” Self said, noting most teams do not vie for league titles or secure No. 1 seeds. “It’s not the end of the earth. We are still in play to have a storybook finish.”
This story was originally published January 26, 2021 at 8:29 AM with the headline "‘Today was a long day’ KU’s Self says of practice, meeting after third straight loss."
