3 more things to think about ahead of Kansas men’s basketball tipping off against Baylor
Baylor is going to challenge Kansas men’s basketball Monday in Waco, Texas, and like last season the Bears could very well top the Jayhawks inside the Ferrell Center.
There’s that talented trio of guards in freshman Keyonte George, junior LJ Cryer and redshirt senior Adam Flagler, who carry Baylor’s shot-making from the perimeter and are all more than capable of knocking down 3s. The No. 22 Bears (14-5, 4-3 in Big 12 Conference) are on a four-game winning streak against conference opponents, with three of those victories coming on the road. And the No. 2 Jayhawks (16-3, 5-2 in Big 12) find themselves on a rare two-game losing streak.
After Kansas lost Saturday against No. 13 TCU, though, head coach Bill Self, redshirt junior forward Jalen Wilson and sophomore forward KJ Adams Jr. touched on a few areas they could improve upon to put themselves in better position to win. Considering they spoke after a 23-point shellacking at home against the Horned Frogs, the topics understandably skewed toward the defensive end. A win in Waco would be the Jayhawks’ first on the road against Baylor since Feb. 22, 2020.
Bill Self is more worried about how guys like Kevin McCullar Jr. and Gradey Dick are doing defensively
Freshman guard Gradey Dick has had back-to-back games in which he’s struggled to hit 3s at the level he has over the course of the season. Redshirt senior guard Kevin McCullar Jr. hasn’t been the same scoring threat in Big 12 play he’d shown himself to be during the earlier non-conference stretch. But Self indicated he’s more worried about what guys like those two are doing defensively than having them focus on being reliable scorers alongside Wilson.
Self said when players worry about the right things, they score more. Right now, Self thinks that’s devoting themselves to getting stops. It could be as simple as knowing if someone likes to go right or left, or if a team has a tendency on out-of-bounds plays.
Bill Self is looking at his starting 5 more so than his bench
Self said he was disappointed to see TCU’s bench outscore Kansas’ to the level it did, 39-8, especially considering three of the Jayhawks’ points came from a walk-on in senior guard Michael Jankovich. Self didn’t mean that as anything negative toward Jankovich, he explained, as he meant Kansas saw only five points scored off the bench by players on scholarship. But even though Self highlighted that disparity, one affected by the difference in minutes played by the respective benches, he didn’t highlight bench scoring as a major need moving forward.
Self instead turned his attention to getting the starting five to play better, because as long as they’re not in foul trouble those players are going to be the ones playing the majority of the minutes. If those guys are going to be on the floor that much, Self said they need to do more and be put in position to do more to make their opponents play poorly. Self is looking for contributions from the bench when it comes to things like defense and not turning the ball over.
A lot went wrong for the Jayhawks against the Horned Frogs. That much is clear. Self, though, said bench scoring wasn’t the problem.
KJ Adams Jr. has to stay out of foul trouble
The first seven times this season when Adams finished a game with at least four fouls, Kansas was able to overcome that and come away with wins. The last two times, though, the Jayhawks have lost. Adams fouled out in the loss against Kansas State and had four fouls in the loss against TCU.
The bigs behind Adams on the roster have shown promise at times, but the trust — when it comes to playing time — seems to be solidly with Adams. Super-senior forward Cam Martin has also been unavailable recently due to injury. And so, when Adams gets into foul trouble in Big 12 games, that has the potential to put Kansas at a significant disadvantage.
“It was a lot of just dumb fouls that everybody — (Wilson) and (Dajuan Harris Jr.) — have been telling me I can’t take,” said Adams, speaking to the difficulty of playing in foul trouble. “So, it was kind of hard coming back from that. I just need to be more smarter and just play defense more earlier than I did and not let them catch the ball as easy as we did.”
Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.
This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: 3 things to consider ahead of Kansas basketball tipping off at Baylor
