Jayhawks realize they’ll face hostile atmosphere again Monday at Kansas State

Kansas State’s creative student section provided plenty of reading material for Kansas’ Svi Mykhailiuk before last year’s Sunflower Showdown at Bramlage Coliseum.

Signs pointed Svi’s way during warmups included the inscriptions: “Svi Has More Rushing Yards Than KU Football,” “Today’s Number is 4; Svi Took 4 steps,” “The Travelin’ Man” and “Svi’s Walk of Shame.”

The words didn’t shake the 6-foot-8 shooting guard, whose three-pointer with 2:32 left broke a 63-63 tie and sparked the Jayhawks to a 74-71 victory.

“We always expect them to get on us,” Mykhailiuk said. He drew the ire of K-State fans by hitting a game-winning layup in a 90-88 victory over the Wildcats at Allen Fieldhouse a month before KU’s rematch victory in Manhattan, Kan. — a layup that should have been disallowed because of an uncalled traveling violation.

“We like playing in tough places against tough teams. That’s what we like. We like to show people we can play with everybody,” Mykhailiuk added.

He and fellow senior Devonté Graham are 2-1 at Bramlage and 6-1 overall against K-State heading into Monday’s 8 p.m. clash between the fifth-ranked Jayhawks (17-4, 6-2) and Wildcats (16-5, 5-3) in Manhattan. It will be shown live on ESPN.

“It will be a hard game,” said Mykhailiuk. He has scored 24 points in consecutive games — Saturday’s 79-68 home victory over Texas A&M and Tuesday’s 85-80 loss at Oklahoma.

“We’ve got to be focused, tight huddle. Every game on the road we play pretty well. We’ve got to keep it going — play hard, focus on small details, listen to whatever Coach says.”

The Jayhawks, who had their eight-game Big 12 road winning streak snapped at Oklahoma, normally take the insults hurled at them from the K-State students in stride. Smiles normally break out on both sides at some point prior to tipoff.

“They are pretty funny. It’s always some back-and-forth stuff, both schools, when we go there and they are in Bramlage. It’s all fun,” K-State junior guard Barry Brown told The Star at Big 12 Media Day when asked about Sunflower Showdown artwork of the students in Manhattan.

“I saw that one,” Brown added asked specifically about “Svi’s Walk of Shame.”

“It was pretty funny.”

The crowd became part of the story of last year’s KU victory at Bramlage.

“I’ll be honest the crowd helped us win the game. There’s no doubt about that,” KU coach Bill Self said after the game on Feb. 6. “That’s all we talked about was use their (fans’) energy to give you energy. We even talked about different scenarios and how it was going to help us. And I think it did. I think their crowd energized our guys. I think they really enjoyed playing here today.”

The fans figure to be just as intense this season, again because of what happened in the first meeting, a 73-72 KU victory on Jan. 13 at Allen Fieldhouse.

“I’m really disappointed in some of the calls. But we were all here last year, and same thing,” K-State coach Bruce Weber said in expressing displeasure with the calls immediately after the loss, which was assured when Brown missed a three-pointer on the Wildcats’ final possession.

“It’s a rivalry. Even if it was a 15-, 20-point loss, they’d still be waiting for us,” said KU’s Malik Newman, who had seven points in the first KU-KSU meeting. Graham led the way for KU with 23 points, while Udoka Azubuike had 18 points and Mykhailiuk scored 11. Dean Wade had 22 points and Cartier Diarra scored 18 for K-State.

“We haven’t had them under our microscope, but we knew they’re coming up so we’ve kind of been watching them,” Newman added. “They’ve been playing well (four wins in a row since the KU game). I caught a piece of the Baylor game (90-83 win on Jan. 22). I credit those guys. They’ve got a good team.”

KU enters with a 6-2 Big 12 record. Kansas State, Texas Tech, West Virginia and Oklahoma are all 5-3.

“We’ve gone over there when the stakes have been high before. They’ve put themselves in a great position,” Self said. “They’re a good team. They don’t beat themselves.”

Of individual players, Self said: “Barry and Dean have been their two best performers in the league. They’ll be key guys.”

Self was asked about the possibility of Kansas State junior guard Kamau Stokes possibly returning from injury for this game. He’s missed the last six games because of a left foot injury, which has led to the emergence of redshirt freshman guard Diarra.

“I hope he does (return),” Self said. “That’d be great. I never wish for guys to be hurt. I hope he’s back. It’d be good for them. You never want to see a kid go down.

“There’s examples like this all the time,” Self added of players such as Diarra emerging because of a teammate’s absence. “Other guys get opportunities. Diarra wouldn’t have had the opportunities he’s had unless there was an injury. Now when he (Stokes) comes back they’ve got three starters, three guys that are all good enough to start in our league in the backcourt. I can’t see how that did anything but help their team.”

As far as the atmosphere KU will face Monday, Self concluded: “Our players will need to come with a serious mind-set to go fight. This will be one of the harder games that we play all year. We will not play in a better atmosphere than we will on Monday.”

This story was originally published January 28, 2018 at 5:40 PM with the headline "Jayhawks realize they’ll face hostile atmosphere again Monday at Kansas State."