One year ago, KU seemed poised for NCAA title run. Those dreams were long gone Monday
Kansas men’s basketball coach Bill Self had long wanted to coach a game in Hinkle Fieldhouse, the 9,100-seat marvel of Butler University.
And why not? The 1928 venue boasts gorgeous architecture and a rich tradition, including being highlighted in the classic 1986 basketball movie “Hoosiers.” And while it’s certainly not a mirror image of Allen Fieldhouse, it bears the same grassroots vibe of a basketball cathedral in the middle of a beautiful campus.
But the throwback setting, and the opponent, proved inhospitable for Kansas on Monday night, when the third-seeded Jayhawks suffered the most lopsided loss in their 157 NCAA Tournament games: an 85-51 fiasco against sixth-seeded Southern California.
“That’s about as poor as we can play,” said Self, who also credited USC and later added, “Kansas deserves better.”
Even if you figure “deserve’s got nothing to do with it,” like in the movie “Unforgiven,” it was a bizarre sight, really, to see Kansas out of its element and depth from start to finish and somehow never appearing at home … while playing in its record 31st straight NCAA Tournament.
And maybe this stings all the more because of how it might linger, sandwiched between the tournament that was shut down a year ago when KU appeared to have all the makings of a national championship team and an uncertain future because of the NCAA investigation that could feature penalties including a postseason ban.
Not that this wasn’t plenty disconcerting in itself.
Simply put, led by Isaiah Mobley’s 17 points on four of five three-pointers, USC had what came to feel like unfettered access to the basket. The Trojans made 32 of 56 shots overall (57.1 percent) and 11 of 18 from three-point range, plenty of which were open looks, while Kansas shot just 29 percent (18 of 62, including six of 25 on threes) and was outrebounded 43-27.
As the Trojans poured it on in the final 10 minutes, Self was resigned to the inevitable and relegated to sitting with his chin on his hand, standing calmly with his arms crossed or even rocking back on his chair while glancing at the clock.
Distressed as he might have been after the game, he also was subdued as he described a team he reckoned had less margin for error than any other he’s had at Kansas.
You could say plenty of error went into this whopping margin. Or you could say that it reflected a major matchup problem with a much longer and more dynamic team. And you’d be right on both.
Whatever the case, it doesn’t really reduce the sheer shock factor of seeing this kind of mayhem unleashed on a perennial powerhouse that a year ago had the stuff to win it all only to miss the opportunity because of the pandemic.
Never mind that just from a personnel standpoint, this probably never was going to be one of the better teams of Self’s largely dominant era. When it blasted undefeated and second-ranked Baylor 71-58 a couple weeks ago in the process of winning nine of its previous 10 games entering Monday night, Kansas hinted there might be something bubbling yet this season.
Alas, that run proved to be fool’s gold, to borrow from one of Self’s favorite terms.
Or maybe there became some disturbance in the force once KU withdrew from the Big 12 Tournament because of a positive COVID-19 test in the program and implications that included David McCormack missing more than a week of practice, Jalen Wilson sitting out the first-round game against Eastern Washington and that kept Tristan Enaruna home altogether.
Two days before, Kansas was lucky to beat 14th-seeded Eastern Washington 93-84, Self said.
Certainly, it was anything but that when it came to USC, which seized control early, led for 38 minutes, 21 seconds and never let KU get closer than 16 down in the second half after leading 40-21 at halftime.
If KU didn’t meet the moment at Hinkle, well, it opened the game by paying its own form of tribute to the era in which the venue opened. At least in this sense:
On the date Hinkle was dedicated, March 7, 1928, Kansas was outscored 40-30 by Kansas State.
And for most of the first half Monday, KU was on a similar scoring pace to that after missing its first eight field-goal attempts.
The Jayhawks managed only two baskets in the first 7:35 and didn’t get into double digits until Marcus Garrett’s three-pointer with 9:22 to go in the half to cut the lead to five, 15-10.
The last time a Kansas team had started with such offensive incoherence was in 2013, when KU mustered a 13-point first half in a 62-55 loss at Texas Christian that evoked a memorable reference to yesteryear from Self.
“It’s the worst team Kansas has ever put on the floor since Dr. (James) Naismith was here,” he said that night, adding, “I think he had some bad teams when he lost to Topeka YMCA in his first couple years.”
The offense was less inept later in the half, but by then the defense might as well have been trapped in amber. USC ended the half with an 11-0 run to take a 40-21 lead into the intermission.
“We just didn’t have enough juice to put anything together to make it a game” after that, Self said.
And the rest was history, just not the kind to which KU would aspire while it waits to learn the NCAA’s ruling and when it will have its next chance to make a game of it in the NCAA Tournament.