Balanced Kansas State beats Saint Louis 75-47 for third straight win

If you’re looking for one player’s great game to pin Kansas State’s 75-47 win over Saint Louis on Tuesday night, good luck.

But take a look down the entire lineup, and you might get a better idea how K-State managed to dispatch the Billikens in such easy fashion.

The Wildcats improved to 10-2 and won their third straight game behind three players in double-digit scoring, led by Wesley Iwundu’s 13 points, and with 10 players scoring. K-State didn’t have a single player in double digits until Iwundu’s basket with 3:38 left and the game essentially out of reach for Saint Louis, which dropped to 5-7. Iwundu also led K-State with 8 rebounds.

“It’s the best thing about us, look at the stats … 13, 10, 11, 9, 9, 7, 7 (points),” K-State coach Bruce Weber said. “We have good balance when we move the ball and have good possessions.”

Freshman point guard Kamau Stokes added 11 points and Justin Edwards chipped in with 10 for K-State.

After eight lead changes in the first 16 minutes, K-State got a little breathing room late in the first half thanks to an unexpected burst of offense from 6-foot-11 Stephen Hurt and reserve forward Austin Budke.

Budke hit both ends of a 1-and-1 to give K-State a 27-23 lead with 3:44 left, and after Hurt nailed a three-pointer from the left wing for a 33-28 lead with 44 seconds left, Stokes found a cutting Budke with five seconds left for a 35-28 lead at halftime.

“The first half was kind of a knock-down battle,” Weber said. “They made a few shots early, then had some cold spells, and the same with us ... just sometimes our cold spells mean questionable shots and turnovers. We had a nice run at the end of the first half, the last five minutes, and did a good job of keeping that momentum going in the second half.

“That was a nice pass from Kam to Austin. The right pass.”

Edwards set the tone on the first basket of the second half, putting the ball on the floor and driving to the hoop for an authoritative, two-handed dunk.

Saint Louis never seriously threatened after that, with Kamau Stokes’ three-pointer putting K-State up 41-30 and the Billikens only able to cut the Wildcats’ lead to single digits once more, at 43-35.

“That’s pretty much what we’re built off, tough defense that leads to offense,” Iwundu said. “That last part of the game helped us push the lead, build a good lead and that ended up being enough for us.”

Milik Yarbrough led Saint Louis with 12 points.

“I thought our guys did a lot of good things that didn’t get rewarded in the first half,” Saint Louis coach Jim Crews said. “But in the second half, we weren’t doing very good things on offense, which led to turnovers and buckets for them. We couldn’t get any traction.”

The win boosted K-State’s record for home games to 8-0 in nonconference play — 7-0 plus a win over Colorado State at Intrust Bank Arena. Big 12 play starts on Saturday against West Virginia in Manhattan.

“That’s big-boy basketball, so we better be prepared,” Weber said. “The scheduling Gods didn’t do us any favors. We’ll figure out what we’re made of right away.”

KANSAS STATE 75, SAINT LOUIS 47

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Percentages: FG .333, FT .471. Three-Point Goals: 5-28, .179 (Yarbrough 2-5, Roby 1-4, Yacoubou 1-4, Gillmann 1-6, Bartley 0-2, Bishop 0-2, Reynolds 0-2, Crawford 0-3). Blocked Shots: 1 (Gillmann). Turnovers: 19 (Yarbrough 4, Yacoubou 4, Agbeko 2, Crawford 2, Reynolds 2, Hines 2, Bishop, Gillmann, Neufeld). Steals: 7 (Gillmann 2, Bartley 2, Hines, Roby, Reynolds). Technical Fouls: None.

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Percentages: FG .500, FT .692. Three-Point Goals: 5-15, .333 (Hurt 1-1, Budke 1-1, Ervin II 1-1, Stokes 1-2, Edwards 1-5, Wade 0-1, Freeman 0-1, Iwundu 0-1, Brown 0-2). Blocked Shots: 0. Turnovers: 14 (Hurt 3, Iwundu 3, Budke 3, Stokes, Brown, Ervin II, Johnson, Edwards). Steals: 11 (Edwards 2, Iwundu 2, Ervin II 2, Brown 2, Stokes, Johnson, Rohleder). Technical Fouls: None.

Half: Kansas State 35-28. Att: 12,528. Officials: James Breeding, Mark Schnur, Andrew Walton.

AP-WF-12-30-15 0335GMT

This story was originally published December 29, 2015 at 8:30 PM with the headline "Balanced Kansas State beats Saint Louis 75-47 for third straight win."