Kansas Jayhawks’ defense has been stellar, especially in last two Big 12 road wins
Kansas’ ball-hawking defense, which had 13 steals to West Virginia’s seven in Wednesday night’s 58-49 victory over the Mountaineers at WVU Coliseum, has certainly been sparking the Big 12’s second-place team of late.
KU (21-3, 10-1), which won in Morgantown, West Virginia after defeating TCU 60-46 on Saturday in Fort Worth, Texas, has held back-to-back conference opponents to under 50 points for the first time since the 2012-13 season, when Bill Self’s Jayhawks held Texas Tech to 46 points and Baylor 44.
“We are pretty connected on the defensive end,” KU coach Self said, noting senior center Udoka Azubuike and junior guard Marcus Garrett have to each be included as one of the top, if not top defenders at their positions respectively in the country. “We have the potential to get better.”
On Wednesday, Garrett plucked five steals, all in the second half, as KU, which trailed by nine points with 13 1/2 minutes left, outscored WVU 34-19 the final 20 minutes.
“He (Azubuike) gives them a defensive force in there that makes it tough to score driving it to the basket,” WVU coach Bob Huggins said of the 7-footer, who had two blocks in 30 foul-plagued minutes.
“Offensively he’s a brute. Garrett has been very good for them a long time. I thought we did a good job a while then we got too spread out.”
KU forced WVU into 19 turnovers and TCU 17 the past two road wins.
“We can defend the ball when all five lock in,” Garrett said. “The second half all five were locked in.”
In fact, over the final nine minutes, KU limited WVU to just one field goal. In that span, the Jayhawks outscored the Mountaineers 18-3.
KU committed just 13 turnovers at West Virginia, but was outrebounded 38-27. The KU defense held West Virginia to just 27.5% shooting in the second half. It marked the 10th time this season and the fifth time in Big 12 play that a KU opponent has shot 30% or worse in a half.
“This was a grind it out tough road win. Sometimes when you go play a second conference game against a team on the road in an arena where they are ready to pounce on you, you have to grind it out. Regardless of executing or whatever it was a really good road win for us,” Self said.
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Sign up“We have not won at West Virginia a ton (3-5 record in WVU Coliseum). I don’t know we’ve ever won here when pretty or at home pretty against Bob. I don’t think you can be a execution team and have a lot of success against them. They won’t let you cut or pass it where you want to pass it,” Self added.
KU will next meet Oklahoma at 11 a.m. Saturday in Allen Fieldhouse. The Jayhawks currently are 10-1 in the league; first place Baylor 11-0.
More on Wilson redshirt plan
Self has decided to redshirt freshman wing Jalen Wilson, who had ankle surgery after the second game of the season, then after recovering, had back spasms.
Self discussed Wilson’s redshirt after the KU-WVU game.
“We talked yesterday. I don’t want him to (play less than 100%). He doesn’t want to. I think he can (still) get a lot out of practice. He and Dajuan (Harris, redshirt) and Mitch (Lightfoot, redshirt), they should make every practice like a Big 12 road game,” Self said.
Huggins on his Mountaineers
West Virginia dropped to 6-5 in the league after falling at home to KU. WVU is 12-1 at home this season.
“They (Mountaineers) are nice guys. They’re good guys. I don’t know what to say, whether it’s we’re not mature enough, we’re not experienced enough, we aren’t tough enough to grind out games like this,” Huggins said. “We’re playing against a very experienced team. We have an average of 1.2 years of experience on our team, which is a whole lot lower when you take into account that (senior forward) Logan (Routt) really doesn’t play. (Senior guard) Chase (Harler) doesn’t play a whole lot of minutes. (Senior guard) Jermaine (Haley) doesn’t play a whole lot of minutes, so it’s probably less than that, really.
“That’s a fact. That’s not an excuse, it’s a fact. I would hope to think that as they mature and get better and go through the grind, I would hope that they would respond and get tougher, be more active, guard better, pass better. They just don’t know.”
This story was originally published February 13, 2020 at 10:32 AM.
