KU’s big men have struggled early: ‘We’ve got to get to where we don’t turn it over’
A recurring problem has plagued Kansas’ No. 1-ranked basketball team this preseason.
“This is the fourth time we have either played a game or scrimmaged 40 minutes with officials. We’ve had 22, 21, 21 and 22 turnovers, so our consistency in turning the ball over has been apparent,” KU coach Bill Self said after the Jayhawks committed 22 turnovers in a somewhat sloppy 93-55 victory over Emporia State last Thursday night at Allen Fieldhouse.
“We’ve got to get to where we don’t turn it over,” Self added.
Frontcourt players Udoka Azubuike, Dedric Lawson, David McCormack and Mitch Lightfoot combined for 15 of the Jayhawks’ 22 turnovers in the preseason opener.
“Doke had six and Dedric and David combined for eight (four apiece). That’s unacceptable,” said Self, a bit bothered by the big-man bobbles. “Every time we play, our bigs lead our team in turnovers. Every scrimmage, our bigs have had two-thirds of our turnovers. That’s something we have to correct.”
Self offered a reason for Thursday’s many frontcourt turnovers.
“They (Hornets) trapped the post. We have not worked on trapping the post at all, maybe 15 minutes this year,” Self said. “So that’s our (coaches) fault too.
“Also you’ve got to catch it and not be scared of the trap. You don’t need to bounce it in there. When you are two feet away you don’t need to get closer. We can work on some of those things.”
Junior forward Lightfoot committed just one turnover in 12 minutes. Sophomore power forward Silvio De Sousa did not play as the NCAA and KU look into eligibility issues brought up in the recent trial regarding corruption in college basketball recruiting.
“We are going to be good inside,” Self said after Lawson’s 31-point outing. McCormack and Lightfoot scored three points apiece and Azubuike two. The four frontcourt players combined for 27 rebounds.
“How good we are inside will be determined in large part how our perimeter plays and how we shoot it, those sorts of things,” Self added. “I do believe we can score inside. There were times last year and even the year before with certain lineups in there the ball didn’t move as well. I believe we’ve got four guys that can all make threes in the game. That includes Dedric but it’s probably not a 40 percent three-point shooting team (like last year).”
KU did knock down 40 percent of its threes (12 of 30) versus ESU.
Sophomore combo guard Charlie Moore was 3 of 5 from beyond the arc, Lawson 2 of 4, Lagerald Vick 1 of 6, Quentin Grimes and Marcus Garrett 1 of 3, K.J. Lawson 1 of 4 and Lightfoot 1 of 2. Ochai Agbaji who is a possible red-shirt candidate, was 2 of 2 from three. Devon Dotson missed his only attempt.
“Sometimes you have to shoot three or four to make one or two where in the past Svi (Mykhailiuk) could make four or five in a row and Malik (Newman) did when it counted the most,” Self said. “We knew Devonté (Graham) could make them. Our big guys will score as many points as our perimeter plays well. If that’s the case they could score a lot of points.”
In their opener against an NCAA Division II team, the Jayhawks hit 33 of 65 shots overall for 50.8 percent. The Hornets made 27.8 percent of their shots including 9 of 34 threes for 26.5 percent.
“I’ve said all along inconsistent perimeter shooting has been something that can hurt us,” Self said. “If you are not consistent shooting it, do we have the bodies and depth to be a great rebounding team? That has to become an even bigger strength for us because we are not going to run bad offense and come away with three points near as much as we have the last couple years.”
KU did outrebound the NCAA Division II Hornets, 59-31, on Thursday. The Jayhawks, however, finished with just 20 offensive rebounds to ESU’s 16.
“I don’t think we know how to make winning plays consistently and that could be simply guarding the ball late clock, rotation rebounding, a lot of things we don’t do very well and may not do well for a while until our guards get comfortable,” Self said. “The thing is if our bigs don’t play a lot better than that, what’s the strength of our team? We should be able to play inside out. We’ve got to be a lot better at our strengths. If we do that, our guards will be better too. We’ll get shots after that.”
KU will next meet Washburn in a 7 p.m. exhibition Thursday at Allen Fieldhouse. KU opens for real against Michigan State on Nov. 6 in Indianapolis.
“I feel like we can definitely improve. First game, we were just getting the jitters out,” freshman guard Dotson said. “There’s been a lot of growth just playing with each other and getting more familiar with each other and building that chemistry out there on the court.”
Gary Bedore
Gary Bedore covers University of Kansas athletics for The Star.
This story was originally published October 29, 2018 at 11:49 AM.