Timeout? Foul? Bill Self explains Kansas basketball’s final possession in loss to WVU
As Kansas basketball center Hunter Dickinson noted after his team’s heartbreaking loss to West Virginia, much will be speculated about KU’s last shot attempt — which missed.
It was certainly a talking point postgame among Kansas fans on social media, primarily because the Jayhawks chose not to use their final timeout after attempting a full-court pass with 1.8 seconds left.
The Jayhawks trailed 62-61 — the eventual final score — but had a chance to win the game. Inbounding after a West Virginia free throw, Dickinson threw a full-court pass to KJ Adams, who collected it inside the arc and missed a desperation shot as time expired.
KU coach Bill Self shared his thoughts about the play in his postgame news conference.
“We had a timeout, but to be honest with you, I thought we were better off running something where I thought they would put somebody on the ball,” Self said. “If they put someone on the ball, that means KJ is one on one. If we call timeout, there’s a chance they will talk about it and put two guys back and therefore, KJ won’t get a naked catch. That’s about as good as you can do. It’s a good pass and KJ got a naked catch. It just didn’t work out.”
When Adams went up for the shot, there appeared to be contact — and a potential foul.
Self’s view?
“When you lose, we all have a tendency to bitch about officiating,” Self said. “When you win, sometimes you take it for granted that maybe (you) got a friendly whistle. The play at the end is probably a foul early in the game, but I’m not sure there’s a lot of people that would call a foul on the last possession.
“It’s disappointing to me. I thought he got fouled on the catch and got reached, but the whole deal is there’s one second left and you’re probably not going to get that call. So certainly I am not going to dwell on not getting that call. I could probably dwell on us not playing as well as we could have played or with the intensity we could have played with earlier that maybe put that that call to be pointless because we wouldn’t have been in that situation.”
The Jayhawks trailed by as many as 18 points on Tuesday. They shot 38.8% from the field, 25% from 3 and had only seven offensive rebounds.
“There (were) a lot of plays leading up to it that we could have changed the outcome of,” Dickinson said. “So there will be a lot of speculation on the last play, but we put ourselves in that position with a terrible first half and then continuing early in the second half.”
This story was originally published December 31, 2024 at 5:25 PM with the headline "Timeout? Foul? Bill Self explains Kansas basketball’s final possession in loss to WVU."
