🏀 KuBuckets Archive

You don't have to be able to shoot well, just shoot more.

WVU was nearly +20 on FGAs.

WVU shot about twice as many 3ptas.

WVU had 7 more strips.

3>2.

KU only shot 11 treys.

This is like a rifle platoon going into a fire fight with grenade launchers and mortars and NOT using them, and not calling in artillery, just relying on M-16s and effort.

It almost worked.

But why do it at all?

P.S.: I had a petit mal seizure today and picked KU to win +10 based on our superior trey balling. Without putting too fine a point on it, that prediction sucked! :-)

@JayHawkFanToo

I read somewhere that some A-10s are being converted to drones and so will fly on. The story said some will be used for flying into storms for atmospheric weather research, and some reputedly for things like border work. Maybe they will put drone tankers aloft and just keep the A-10s flying 24/7 for the next 50 years. Probably won't even need maintenance. :-) Kind of like Mercedes Benz 300TD wagons being the last things still running in Lebanon back in the day. Fairchild made one tough flying machine.

@HighEliteMajor

Frank most Definitely is our A-10. He can take a lotta hits and keep raining hell fire!!!!

@JayHawkFanToo

Quick we need to no bid a bunch of those Wayne and BG!!!

@BeddieKU23

If they give you speed, you take it.

@JayHawkFanToo

Maybe not. Artillery is crucial to shaping a high mobility battle field from afar.

@REHawk

HA!

KU +10

Wayne snaps Huggie's man bra on a run out!

Frank and Wayne come up big in their native time zones.

Perry decides after running into a guy the last game that contact is fun and gets 18 and 9.

Cliff starts out strong, but the pace and violence are too much and Lumbering Landen discovers he has a higher gear!!!

Full scale, high mobility combat for 30 minutes, then half court grind for ten with a microburst of treys that the Jar Head Jayhawks defend to a W!!!!!!!!

Now I am running for cover!!!!! 😄

@BeddieKU23

Not sure I follow you.

UK has 10 OAD/TADs, maybe the biggest talent advantage in sports since the 1927 Yankees.

Yet they are eeking out wins against teams some SEC teams?

They are playing in the weakest power conference in the country and they are eeking out wins in February?

With 10 OAD/TADs?

And you think this because everyone is giving them their best shot?

What difference does it make if weak teams with no OAD/TADS are giving UK their best shot?

I am not sure it mattered to the 27 Yankees if weak teams gave it their best shot. It didn't used to dent UCLA when weak teams gave them their best shot.

It didn't dent Kentucky early, when KU or other weak teams gave it their best shots. They were blowing KU and others out.

It seems to me more probable that the season has just worn on too long for these guys to stay on an edge, regardless of their mpgs.

They not only shouldn't lose with the talent edge they have, they shouldn't even have close games, except against Duke.

UCLA USED TO HAVE A SMALLER EDGE IN TALENT OVER OTHER TEAMS AND went undefeated 4 times and averaged winning by big margins, even with mostly first year starters.

Indiana didn't seem to have near the talent edge UK has and they struggled some for awhile.

It could be Cal instead of length of season. I have always felt he doesn't get the most out of his talent, just tries to get the most talent.

But to conclude MY HUNCH REMAINS length of season.

Still, since I trust you, I will try to keep closer tabs on the blue, rat bastards and see if you are right.

Rock Chalk!

Reading about Huggins characterizing his team as not a very good shooting team made me as the question in the title to the is post.

I don't have time right now to formalize my hunch and work through it, but I suspect that the 3>2 formula is so powerful that shooting tons of treys would be the best way to overcome bad shooters, rather than the worst way, especially if you have any weakness in the paint, too.

5,4,3,2,1 Go...

The unusual is usual with KU basketball in large part, because Self has reached the stage that he accepts challenges to keep from getting bored.

The World Games will help us and hurt us.

It is a marketing investment necessary to keep the program moving forward. It will help recruiting.

But it will divide focus on our season. It will increase wear and tear and disrupt normal team development and trigger a bigger than normal slump in January/February.

Uk played 7 games before we played them this season. They looked great and stomped us. But now they are struggling because of the early start. They are so deep they keep barely winning.

If the World Games load us with 10 OAD/TADs, then we will muddle through the February slump But maybe not if not.

Welcome aboard!

"Whatever you are, be a good one."
--ALinc

Lincoln was a President. There have been many Presidents. But no one has done it quite like Lincoln did.

More often than not our Presidents are mediocre. They have the basic skills to get there, but not the extraordinary qualities needed to recognize opportunities for action and the wiles and quality of character to endure and triumph being truly who they are.

The past teaches many lessons, many ways to be great at roles, but it can obscure from us the most crucial lesson; that each great person is unique in how he plays the role. We never see the same greatness twice. Ever. Not in all of history. Ever.

Each of us is unique. But we are asked to do the same jobs others have done. Fortunately for us, each job can be done many ways.

Fortunate too are we that circumstances, as similar as their surfaces may seem some times, are as infinitely complex and unique within limits, as is each individual acting in a role within them.

I saw Bill Russell and then Wilt Chamberlain. It seemed impossible to play center more uniquely, or better than these two men did.

But then came Jabbar and Walton. Each shared some similarities with Russell and Wilt, but in the end found stood out as two more newly unique ways to be great at center.

And so on it has gone on with each succeeding great center in the game.

And with each of the merely good centers of the game. Never a duplicate copy. Never another anyone. Never.

Again and again what we see are unique young men of strong will and character finding unique ways to imprint their own unique way of playing the position on a team of unique individuals somehow discovering that that centers unique personality and way of playing center can be just what they need to play well with.

What we can say of Jeff and Landen is that both lacked the extraordinary array of talents possessed by some of the great centers of the game, but they both seem to possess a few of them.

And they both seem to possess the character and will to push to try to both master the minimum requirements of the position and to impose the uniqueness of their characters on the position, rather than just copy what has been done before them.

Just as finally Withey defied all previous molds of exactly how one could play the position with his unique mix of strengths and weaknesses, so to it seems that Landen has sufficient strength of character and will to define the position and role in yet another unique way.

What he does with the role will not be like Withey--will not have been seen before.

But he increasingly seems to have the strength of character and will to get on with forging new kind of center that helps a team win.

With centers of lesser gifts as with persons with lesser gifts , it is always possible for his progress to be interrupted by another great player being recruited.

But he seems to have that little something extra that certain players have that can play a role their own way; that can grow beyond the phase of learning by imitation and make something new of the role.

Self seems to think that what he can bring to the role is a kind of intelligence that is unusual for a big man.

Self is in the fascinating business of recognizing both minimum requirements for roles,'plus recognizing that which has not been seen before in players and finding a use for it on a team.

Every player Self signs for any position seems to possess some of this potential uniqueness that has not been seen before. It seems almost a criterion. It seems to be what he actually means when he recruits characters. They meet minimum basketball requirements, but they also meet some hard to articulate criterion of strongly unique character. Hunter Mickelson demonstrates this. Landen has before this year. Withey the same for a few years.

He can't always find roles for them every season. Sometimes he can't ever find roles for them.

But when he does what they make of the roles is frequently unexpected and unepectely good when it plays out over a season.

We fans want to talk about players as if the were formulas.

Self seems to coach them as if they were unfolding not entirely predictable dynamics.

It is part of his genius that he has managed to systematize...some.

@Lulufulu

Perhaps they have a new wing for coaches with seasons vacated for things they did not know about? 😱

@JayHawkFanToo

Seems reasonable.

@Lulufulu and @HighEliteMajor and @approxinfinity

Regarding the absence of traps, that was clearly an energy saving device for the WVU game on Monday.

Self thought he could win this thing with long benching and no trapping. In other words, he thought he could win the game with KU and the refs beating Baylor at the FT line. Had things not gone according to plan the last ten minutes, I suspect we would have seen the trapping. As it was, Self's strategy was to play them even at everything but FTs and FG% defense and beat them those two places and win the game with a minimum expenditure of energy.

His team is going to have to play all 90 feet for quite a bit of the time against Huggie. Got to keep the tank as full as possible.

If KU had not had to face WVU, I suspect KU could have beaten Baylor by 20 with a total effort.

@HighEliteMajor

I like Drew's zones. You and I have talked about this on occasion. Zone's are good defenses when you stretch them to cover the trey in match ups and have some good bigs inside capable of rim protecting. And switching them up some is good if you switch them up in a way not just to create identification problems, but to take away strengths of certain key players on you opponent. I think Drew is good at coaching the 1-3-1, but I thought switching to a 2-3 and 3-2 zones that actually encouraged KU's strength--trey shooting--was a bad move on his part, even though it cause some recognition problems about where the seams were going to be.

My enduring criticisms of Drew are threefold.

1. He frankly usually has had equally, or more physically talented bigs than we have in recent years and he and his staff coach them so poorly that they don't play anywhere near to their abilities.

2. He copies the right people--Boeheim and Jud Heathcote for zones, Self on offense, but he doesn't show much sign of being able to innovate on either. Thus he is always playing behind the curve of development on both ends of the floor each season.

3. He cannot seem to analyze what the other coach is doing to beat him, much less come up with an adjustment that might remedy it. Self was basically turning it into a FT shooting contest, because it was at home and Self knew the crowd would bend the refs the long things went on. Drew said, sure, let's turn this into a FT contest. And he started banging it inside right along with Self, because he figured he had the better bigs. Hell, I even got sucked in during the game. I thought Drew was doing the right thing to go inside, and over power our bigs, but it was the wrong approach for three reasons: 1.) 3>2 as we always say; 2.) his guys weren't going to get a fair shake from the refs in AFH, so they were going to lose the FT shooting contest unless KU just couldn't hit any; and 3.) Drew's bigs are never fundamentally sound, so they can't really perform up to their abilities, when Self finally short benches for a half and has his guys play their best defense. So: to me, Drew is just getting out coached most of the way you can.

Next, regarding those close scores in the two Baylor games, I am increasingly of the opinion that with Self you have to index the closeness of the score to the placement of the game in a series.

The first Baylor game was the Wednesday of a Sunday-Wednesday-Saturday 3 in 7 sequence of games. It was on the road, too. Thus, Self was going to do one of his long bench, low possession things the first Baylor game, to preserve energy for following game, plus he was not going to leave it all on the floor for a road win that could be made up in AFH later. Self was going to try to "steal" one in Waco, and he did: 56-55. Self would like to have had a 5 point win there, but as I have said elsewhere, Self is increasingly about winning by 1, not crushing opponents. The score 56-55 was exactly the way he wanted to "steal" one there, so that he would be ready for the third game in the series. So: tight score says less about how good Drew is and more about how good Self is at scripting these games in series.

This second game with Baylor in AFH is a different deal, because it is a 2 game in 3 day series with the back end on the road against WVU--a physical team that we have the talent to beat, even on the road, if we have enough energy to handle their press and their size. Self looked at this Baylor game and said, "Well, I already stole a win in Waco, so I don't have to leave every thing on the floor to get a home W. I've got the crowd and the refs on my side. I've got a not to bright coach for an opponent. But he's got a lot of talented, but not very sound players. Got to take them seriously, but the bottom line is that if we could beat Baylor here AND steal one in Morgantown, we would practically ice an 11th conference title. And since anyone, especially Frank, could get injured any time, and I've got a chance to pretty much ice this thing if I just gamble a little with long benching in Lawrence, well, then we could have enough energy to steal one in Morgantown and then if some one gets hurt down the stretch, I can still find a way to bailing wire the team through to the title. So Self long benches the first half and it takes balls of steel, because Baylor has better bigs and some decent players and jumps out to a significant lead. But Self bides his time and closes the first half to within 5 and then comes out neutrally balanced the first five minutes to see what Scott is going to throw at him. Scott says I am going to give you some different zones to look at, not M2m. Scott also says I am going to try to bang inside and over power your bigs and win it at the FT line, just like you are going to do. So: Self grins like a Cheshire cat. He goes if the kid is willing to try to beat KU and the referees, then all I have to do is shop for moment from ten to go to have Oubre and Greene build me a little lead from three, and then we'll let the refs do the heavy lifting for us from there on out. And so the score looks like it was close again, but except for about 10-12 minutes down the stretch of the second half, KU is NOT leaving it all out on the court. And things broke so well that Self was able to play and win with Lucas and let Big Red Dog basically rest up his sore sternum and gimpy knees for Morgantown.

What I am trying to say is that Drew may less be driving the tight scores than Self trying to win sets of games.

KU 2pt%

47-18=29

22-6=16

16/29=55%

KU 3pt%

6/18=.33

KU 3pt%effective

6x3=18/2=9/18=50%

BU 2pt%

56-23=33

21-8=13

13/33=.39

BU 3Pt%

8/23=.347

BU 3pt% effective

8x3=24/2=12/23=52%

FTAs

KU:29

BU 18

Above are the 2pt% and 3pt% and FT attempts for the KU victory over BU in AFH.

The numbers show both teams shot similar 3pt% with KU at an effective 3pt% of 50% and BU at an effective 3pt% of 52%.

KU had 16 3ptas and BU had 23 3ptas.

2pt% shooting hugely favored KU at 55% for KU and 39% for BU.

KU had a lot fewer 2ptas than BU: KU 29 and BU 33.

Refs favored KU with 11 more FTAs, not surprising since this was in AFH.

First, half BU looked like it might walk away from KU.

But the second half,when both sides started pounding it inside, all the foul calling went KU’s way.

So: what did Self do to win this game and/or what did Drew do to lose it?

Statistically, both teams performed similarly shooting, on the boards, and in TOs.

Self did not win this game, unless letting another coach beat himself.

Drew lost it, by beating himself.

How did he do this?

Drew coached the game as if he were going to get a fair whistle. He told his guys to pound it inside, which was a very sound strategy, if one were going to get a fair whistle.

But a wise coach NEVER bets on a fair whistle on the road. NEVER.

What should Scott have done instead? Three things.

Shoot 10-15 more 3s.
Stay with his 1-3-1 and stretch it to take away all but 30 feet 3ptas by KU.
Give KU anything inside it wanted without fouling, unless it was one of KU’s few bad FT shooters.

Scott’s team shot an effective 50% from trey. It shot 39% from 2. Each shot from two was a terrible waste of a possession. 3>2 Einstein. Shoot the trey, when you are not getting the calls banging inside.

Except for the zoning, Scott coached an almost Bill Self like game. And like Self, he was doomed by doing so.

Self has learned slowly but surely that on the road, or even at home when your guys are a step slow, you build a lead with outside shooting. Always. Always. Always. Always.

Then you defend by tightening it up, lengthening possessions and shortening the game.

Bill Self now understands that when you are playing the referees on the road, then you shoot threes to build leads, then defend the leads and expose yourself to as little referee risk as possible.

Scott has copied the old Bill Self.

Now he has to copy the new one.

At home, with a game on Monday night, you lengthen your bench the first half, try to hang around by half time, then come out and hang around till the right moment and the shoot the trey to build the lead, even though you have been sucking at the trey so far. You hang around playing inside. You make leads by shooting the trey. And you shoot the trey to make leads even when you aren’t making them. And when the refs are on your side, you stop as soon as you get a little lead and defend the lead and draw fouls.

The counter intuitive thing all coaches are still struggling with is that the lower your raw trey percentage is the more you want to shoot MORE treys, because the lower the raw percentage gets the higher the probability is that you will begin shooting back to your raw average.

Further, when ever you are on the road and shooting 33-35% raw, you are shooting around 50-52% effective. If your season average is around 40%, you are completely nuts if you don’t turn your trey ballers shooting 33-35% raw loose to shoot a bunch of treys and shoot back to their average.Why? Because your opponent, free riding on the referee bias at home, is going to be going inside to make inside treys. Your only chance, and it is a very good chance, is to stop all fouling near the bucket on defense, and start shooting treys for all you are worth. Your effective trey percentage and PPP will be so much higher than the home team that is trying unsuccessfully for inside treys you are refusing to give him (i.e., refusing to foul him), that you will build a lead you can then defend.

On the road, its you against the opponent and the referees.

At home, it is you and the referees against the opponent.

There are no fair games.

EVER.

Outside treys are one way to counteract the referee bias on the road.

@Crimsonorblue22

Thank you kindly.

@Crimsonorblue22

Don't underestimate yourself.

Or overestimate me.

I am just an old alias fond of the Jayhawks.

@Crimsonorblue22

Ok. Thx for the heads up.

@drgnslayr

Is that image a still from a soon to be released major motion picture called "Spore Man"?

@Crimsonorblue22

Did @ralster actually write that Self kicked CF off the team? This is news to me. I recall CF announcing he was leaving for more opportunity elsewhere. I guess I missed it. Can you post the link to his post. I would like to read it. Thanks in advance.

@brooksmd

HOWLING!

Was that the marketing name for that fabric? Or did you just make that up? :-)

@drgnslayr

I hear adidas has a two for one sale on some of those uniforms from two years ago.

@KUSTEVE

PHOF x 2

@REHawk

Coach, I have a serious question for you. Do you think there is any chance Snacks took a fall for someone?

(subsequent response to @JayHawkFanToo 's and @Crimsonorblue22 's comments below)

@JayHawkFanToo

No, I have just visited Peoria, never lived there. So: no, I was just asking, not inviting someone to tie me in to the story. :-)

I don't know who he might take a fall for. It seems you have attempted to rule out some possibilities. Do you think you have exhausted the list? I don't know much about this sort of thing? it just seems odd that a bright ambitious professional would knowingly expose himself to this kind of risk in an era of D1, when a significant number of big time programs had in recent years been objects of investigations and scandals originating outside the NCAA investigators activities. You know what I mean?

@Crimsonorblue22

What happened has seemed very, very odd to me. I can't really say why, even. Its not that it has appeared kind of orchestrated. I reckon many of these kinds of stories have appeared to get some kind of orchestration. It was more the way the orchestration appeared to go that seemed odd to me. Doesn't media coverage of these things often start with an arrest, rather than the completion of service? I don't know.

Regardless, I just wondered if anyone else thought it an odd situation, and a possibilty. I had read some posts where board rats that seemed in the know appeared very confident that Snacks would have to leave some how, maybe even fairly soon, as a result of this, and so I was kind of surprised with only a two week suspension. It also seemed odd to me how short of time Coach Self appeared to collect information about what I recall him characterizing as an internal personnel issue. In the past, I at least recall he has been pretty deliberate in some of his information gathering. If I recall correctly, sometimes weeks have passed. This time, again if I recall correctly, it appeared only to take a day or two of information gathering before he announced a two week suspension. Again, maybe its nothing.

I have tried to post some humor in the wake of the situation, but I really just don't know what to make of oddity of the situation still. Maybe nothing at all.

Rock Chalk!

Doogie God Love--the STD of sports broadcasting.

@drgnslayr

HOWLING!!!!

Keitzman, schmeitzman, the guy is a KSU schmendrick.

Coach Drew: Oxymoron

Baylor Green with KU Envy

Fool’s Gold: 20-4

Inside Out: Who We Aren’t

SPCA:Baylor is mascot abuse

Holly: After Noon Light at Allen Makes Me Hot

Smoke Baylor.

(Note: All fiction. No malice.)

@wissoxfan83

It was a classic the moment you typed it. I saw it and thought I PHOF-ed it. If I did not...

You have entered the pantheon of basketball epigrammatists with it.

PHOF.

@JayHawkFanToo

"Looking inside the trunk

Under the hood, hoping to find

The secret places where you

Always keep your mind

Whoa, whoa, no, Tarkio Road"

--Brewer and Shipley

@Lulufulu

I recall a friend saying the police in Lawrence used to use the Oreo test. If they pulled you over and found an empty Oreo package in your car after 10PM they took you in. Rim shot. :-)

(added subsequently)

@Crimsonorblue22

What do you think of this business with Snacks? Is it going to end here, or will there be more drama at a later date?

Beating Baylor.

Sweeping Baylor and WVU.

Winning an 11th B12 Title.

Beating Kentucky for a ring.

Shortcomings in KENPOM's algorithms.

The strengths and weaknesses of RPI.

How much bigger other guys look than we do, while standing at urinals in public restrooms.

Whether Oprah will ever really stabilize her weight and retire.

What those unmarked white airplanes are spraying in the sky.

Whether Allen Turing was gay, bi-sexual, or just strongly attracted to vacuum tubes.

The possibility of horniness on other exo planets in the Milk Way Galaxy.

The probability of the Kardashians spontaneously combusting before doing anything else requiring no talent.

My dog running away with a neighbor's wife and living happily in Dubai on bitcoins stolen from me.

Amazon women taking over the global convenience store oligopoly and forcing men to buy Trojan contraceptives in unnecessarily large quantities for women that don't put out.

Members of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs ordering all the services to wear invisibility kilts.

Gundam wings taking over the fighting of all preemptive resource wars on Earth and winning, then declaring reality a cartoon universe.

Vast expanses of the universe discovered to be filled with Chartreuse Matter that compels us all to send uninspired valentines to loved ones.

A giant unabridged collection of Remembrance of Things Past put in stationary orbit over Watson Library.

The first Hooters Restaurant on Mars accessible by Space X with frequent flyer miles earned from purchases with a leading credit card.

Half truths.

(Note: All fiction. No malice.)

@nuleafjhawk

LOL!

(added subsequently)

@JayHawkFanToo

Nor I.

Cue Brewer and Shipley.

@VailHawk

Howling!

The HIGH Post Offense

The HIGH-Low Post Offense

The Pick and Roll Your Own

Man2Munch Defense

The Zoned Out Defense

Dribble Snack Offense

The Pick and Paranoid Pop play

The Fade Smoke Curl play

The Bong Rip Runout

The Mary Jane Sideline Trap

The Ditch Weed Drive

The Put It on the Deck and Doja

The Baseline Ganja

The Bubonic Chronic Dunk

The Skunk Weed Backdoor

The Schwag Swagger

The Pakalo Pick

The Full Court Zombie

The Paca Lolo Post Feed

The Airhead Alley Oop

A green bud recruiting ice breaker.

A 420 flop

(Note: this is all fiction. No malice.)

@drgnslayr

Howling!

Some Places an Assistant Basketball Coach Might Serve a Brief Suspension for Misdemeanor Possession of Marijuana

Alaska

California

Colorado

Connecticut

District of Columbia

Maine

Maryland

Massachusetts

Minnesota

Mississippi

Nebraska

Nevada

New York

North Carolina

Ohio

Oregon

Rhode Island

Vermont

(Note: this is a joke. It is only a joke. If it were intended seriously, you would have been asked to turn to your Civil Defense channel for further instructions. It is also made sans malice.)

It is the best post ever.--jaybate 1.0 Wink. Wink. Nudge. Nudge. :-)

"I contain no parasitical spam. My spam is perfect. It is well ordered. Error. Error. ERROR, ER-flipping-OR!"

@approxinfinity

Howling!

@VailHawk

I am spam bot. You are the creator!

--from The Changeling episode of Spam Trek

@VailHawk

Howling!

@Jesse-Newell

Right place + riget time + right instruments + hard work = awards

Repeating ---->rewards

@JayHawkFanToo

Holy cow, 10 in double digit mpg?

Huggie is out to muggie opponents.

Thanks for the heads up on THAT stat.

Huggins is a really, really smart guy, but like a lot of guys (e.g. Tubby Smith, Trent Johnson, etc.) later in their careers he has either jumped, or fallen, or been pushed off the talent gravy train and so has to be inventive working with players with XTReme Limitations. Huggs, Tubby and Trent all seem to load up with what used to be called prison bodies that can't shoot much, and they try to take away one aspect, or another, of your game, and hope you struggle doing whatever is left.

What I like (or hate if he beats us) about what Huggs is trying is he is trying to make two, or three strings of muscle press and take away your transition baskets, up your TOs, and then slide back into half court and either muscle you inside, or muscle you outside, depending on whatever is your strength.

Apparently the teams you mention have figured out how to solve his press and his guys are not doing a very good job of falling back into half court.

But Huggs players are like everyone else's players, as the season goes on they hopefully keep getting better at what their coach is asking them to learn to do.

What I like about Huggs strategy is that if his guys can ever learn how to get back to half court without giving up the easy baskets you rightly note have been their Achilles Heels in many games, WVU could become very, very tough even though it can't shoot a lick.

Thanks for weighing in. I didn't realize Huggs was playing so many guys.

@RockChalkinTexas

This reputed Cyclone post is too long winded.

Who does this Cyclo-board rat think he/she is wasting precious bandwidth that way?

It is WORSE that squandering precious bodily fluids in the Cold War era!

Doesn't he/she know that the more bandwidth he/she wastes, the more countries the Anglo-American-Abiotic Oil Refiner's Oligopoly and Lawn Bowling Club has to invade preemptively to create trade banks in said countries so as to make reconstruction loans collateralized with the oil under Jihadists and crazy dictators to rebuild the infrastructures degraded with fuel-air bomblets dropped from nano-drones?

What has become of warfare, @RockChalkinTexas? Fuel-air bomblets? Nano-drones? Pico Rays? Wars run by cellphones and Twitter? By god where's the glory in that? We have hundreds of fine old A10 Warthogs in mothball gathering dust that could be supporting real ground troops in real ground maneuvers against those ISIL, or ISIS, or ITSITS morons! What is the world coming to?

And what is this Cyclo-board rat's mid-major malfunction?

Is it that guy that stalked our great coach awhile back?

Surely, not!

Are all stalkers so long winded and obviously unfair and unbalanced in their opinions on sports, @RockChalkinTexas?

The next thing you know he/she is going to be advocating an invasion of the panhandle of Texas to secure its oil fields for collateralizing loans made to the Trade Bank of Lukenbach, where Waylon and Willie are still the kings.

By god, this is unAmerican and it has to stop.

I want microwave mind control energy directed at whomever is responsible, until he/she reduces word length to something responsible and patriotic.

Emboss me Jeezus in the backboards of life.

Respectfully submitted,
Brigadier Corporal jay Ripperbate 1.0 (Dept. of State Private Contractor Army-Ret.)

P.S.: Goooooooooood morning East Turkestan!!!!

:-)

(Note: the above is all satire and fiction. With an absence of malice. Glad to see some Cyclones having fun with the medium, too. Part of what makes America great are her citizens' irreverent senses of humor in times of trial...and error. )

@drgnslayr

By the way, quite a beautiful river scene.

@drgnslayr

Fact: 20-4 aka .833 aka equal to his ten year average winning percentage.

Fact: first place in B12 in mid February aka the driver's seat.

Fact: 41% of total FGAs were 3ptas last game against a team that takes away the inside game and gives the three, which means Self took what they gave us.

Self's post game comments were geared to do all of what you said plus three more things.

Self knows shooting 41% of FGAs as 3ptas and winning by nearly 20 points creates an expectation in fans of doing that the next game, and every game.

Self's remarks were aimed to eliminate the expectation on the part of his team, his opponents, and his fans that the next game they would shoot 41% again. Why did he do this? Because he knows "who we are" is whatever they give us; i.e., whatever they don't take away. A 41% of FGAs 3pta game, in which we make 50% of our treys will encourage opponents to "take away" our trey; i.e., to guard the trey stripe and push us two feet farther out. When they do this, Self will go back to inside out, as surely as night follows day, and he should, unless they stop the ten feet and in game, while over guarding the trey. If they take away both the trey stripe and the ten feet and in game, then that leaves us the weaves--three-man variety and 4-man variety--in the mid range.

The second reason his made these remarks was because our next opponent is Baylor and Baylor plays zone. Playing zone will make our fans think we should shoot the same high percentage of FGAs as 3ptas., maybe even more. But Baylor plays a match-up zone that stretches to guard the trey stripe, guards the rim, and gives the seams. Self knows that Drew will be inclined to stretch his matchup zone even more for hot shooting, long balling KU. He is signalling Drew, but our fans to, to be prepared for long grind of scoring in the seams, rather than trey balling. And if KU successful scores in the seams, Drew will probably come out into m2m, rather than pack the zone to close the seams. In man to man mode, he will probably also go inside, at least until they prove they can stop KU inside.

The third reason for creating the expectation of an inside out game versus Baylor, is that Baylor is part of a Saturday-Monday set of games with a road game against a pressing team in WVU. Self knows that in order to win two games in three days he is going to have to turn the Baylor game into a very low possession, ugly grind it out type of game; that means inside out and mid range weaves and ONLY opening it up to create a little lead that he will then tighten down to defend and shorten the game. I expect we will see a bunch of tiny leads defended by Self, and we will see Drew constantly trying to jump the tempo. It depends on who Baylor has to play on Monday. But Self knows he is going to have employ the very kind of slow down, grind it out strategy that makes his fans scream. He will also have to go to a long bench,and along bench requires slow down and grind, also, because a lot of our backups are not reliable in a fast paced game.

So: what about WVU? This game could be very ugly too. WVU's press takes away the transition baskets. That means KU has to score in half court against a big muscle bound team of non shooters on the road where KU won't get a fair whistle. It also means KU will have a bunch of TOs. Fans will say, "Fine, micro burst the treys in half court coach!" But WVU is long enough inside to handle our bigs and so Huggie is likely to stretch and defend the trey stripe and see if our soft bigs can play head up inside and beat his hard bigs. Self will take what Huggie gives. It means an ugly, low possession game with a lot of blocks in which KU will depend on shooting a higher percentage on FGs, 3pters, and FT to win.

So: we fans are facing two very ugly games in which three point shooting may only be used very intermittently.

All in all, his presser after the TxTech beat down was an exercise in managing expectations of his team, his fans, and his next opponent in these regards.

Just checked ESPN and still no mention of this story. Interesting. Seems like ESPN is usually out ahead on this kind of stuff. Hmmm.

KUSports.com had it posted at 6:01 PM (presumed CST) 11 Feb 2015.
http://www2.kusports.com/news/2015/feb/11/report-ku-assistant-coach-jerrance-howard-fined-dr/?mens_basketball ↗

KUSports.com chased the story with an 11 Feb 2015 headline without a time mark and story about Self remembering his "friend" Jerry Tarkanian.
http://www2.kusports.com/news/mens_basketball/ ↗

So: KUSports.com headlines sandwich Self between his assistant completing public service for a reputed pot arrest half a year ago, and his "friendship" with Tarkanian, who some feel has a bad reputation. Hmmmm.

Next to CJONline.com...

CJONline.com posted the Howard story slightly later at 9:24pm (presumed CST) 11 Feb 2015.
http://cjonline.com/sports/hawkzone/2015-02-11/report-ku-assistant-jerrance-howard-pleads-guilty-drug-charge ↗

There has been no chaser yet at CJonline.com as of 12 Feb 2015 as at about 9:43am CST. But the Howard story was preceded by two stories on 11 Feb 2015.

@Jesse-Newell at CJONline.com posted a review of Self's post game comments after the TxTech game questioning Self's logic about playing inside out at 10:07am (presumed CST) 11 Feb 2015.
http://cjonline.com/blog-post/jesse-newell/2015-02-11/kureview-response-bill-selfs-3-point-comments ↗

@Jesse-Newell also posted a story about Cliff Alexander's jitters starting for KU vs. TxTech at 10:07am (presumed CST) 11 Feb 2015.
http://cjonline.com/blog-post/jesse-newell/2015-02-11/kureview-response-bill-selfs-3-point-comments ↗

@Jesse Newell stories posted on CJONline.com so far seem about par for the course for JNew, though the story questioning Self's logic on inside out is probably the most critical story of Self I have seen him post so far.

12 Feb 2015 9:46 am CST--still no ESPN.GO. COM headline listed for Jerrance Howard story.

12 Feb 2015 10:56am CST--still no ESPN.GO. COM headline listed for Jerrance Howard story.

12 Feb 2015 12:33pm CST--still no ESPN.GO. COM headline listed for Jerrance Howard story.

12 Feb 2015 2:42pm CST--still no ESPN.GO. COM headline listed for Jerrance Howard story.

12 Feb 2015 10:45pm CST--ESPN.GO.COM headline listed for Jerrance Howard story. Story did not give a time of posting, so not sure how much earlier it was posted (note: I am posting this about 9:43am CST on 13 Feb 2015).

Timeline for Jerrance Howard story developing...

@Shanghai_RCJH

He was good. That whole UNLV team was good. But KU was better one game.

I wonder when Self coached against Tark? ORU, Tulsa or Illinois?