Jayhawks knock off OU, secure NCAA Tourney spot

South teams go south when they hit Allen
BLAIR KERKHOFF

LAWRENCE — The first lesson Oklahoma needs to absorb after Sunday’s 59-58 loss to Kansas is to never again lodge at the Holiday Inn in Lawrence.

There’s nothing wrong with the fine establishment just off the Kansas Turnpike, except that’s where the Sooners have always stayed the night before the Kansas game under coach Kelvin Sampson, and Oklahoma is now 0-7 in those matchups.

If the way the final 8 minutes unfolded doesn’t prompt a change in itinerary — meals, habits, anything to find some fortune — nothing will. The Jayhawks’ 21-5 exit strategy was the team’s best stretch and Oklahoma’s worst of the season.

It was incredible, really. With Oklahoma leading 53-38, a demoralized Kansas team looked as if it had accepted defeat.

For Kansas, there would have been little shame in a loss. For 32 minutes, Oklahoma had executed an ideal game plan, using its rugged defense to hound KU shooters all afternoon, winning the boards and having big guard Terrell Everett beat defenders with his size and speed. Taj Gray and Kevin Bookout were their usual powerful selves near the basket.

Plus, the Sooners have been just as sizzling as the Jayhawks lately. They knocked off Texas last week, and even KU coach Bill Self recently wondered aloud whether the Sooners weren’t the league’s second-best team behind the Longhorns.

What Oklahoma had working against it Sunday was location. The Sooners just don’t win here. No team from the Big 12 South does.

Kansas now stands 29-0 in Allen against Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, Texas Tech, Texas A&M and Baylor in the Big 12 decade. The Jayhawks can make an even 30 when the Bears visit in two weeks.

Sampson has never won here. Neither have Rick Barnes or Bob Knight. Eddie Sutton has never won a conference game in Lawrence.

And some excellent teams from Oklahoma and Texas have dribbled into Kansas, nationally ranked teams such as the Sooners on Sunday. Final Four teams like Oklahoma in 2002. Teams with the national player of the year like Texas and T.J. Ford in 2003.

All get turned back. How does this happen time and again? Certainly, Kansas is always good. Sunday’s triumph should confirmthat this will be the program’s 17th straight NCAA Tournament team.

But in the Big 12 era, Iowa State has won three times at Allen. Missouri and Nebraska own victories here, and Kansas State took down Kansas earlier this season.

The difference is those teams from the North visit Kansas every year. The South teams are here once every two seasons, and nobody on the Oklahoma roster had ever played in an atmosphere quite like Sunday.

“Terrell and Taj have never been in an environment quite like this,” said Bookout, a senior who didn’t play in Lawrence two years ago because of a shoulder injury. “I thought in those last 7 or 8 minutes, (the home floor) really helped them out. Their younger guys got energized by it and got rolling.”

Especially center C.J. Giles, who had his best moments in a Kansas uniform. His defense was magnificent, and a save he made under the Oklahoma basket fed the Kansas tsunami.

Giles was getting minutes because Sasha Kaun, who also played well, had weary legs. In as physical a game as Kansas will play all season, the center position accounted for nine points, 12 rebounds and four blocks. That contribution was huge.

Giles was one of several Jayhawks saving their best for the last 8 minutes. Brandon Rush’s scoring, defense by Julian Wright, Jeff Hawkins and Russell Robinson, and Mario Chalmers’ gliding drive that proved to be the game-winner with 19.1 seconds remaining left Oklahoma dumbfounded.

“This one is hard to handle because we outplayed them for a long time,” Sampson said.

Self agreed.

“For 32 minutes, they were a lot better than us,” he said.

But for almost 10 years now, when a South team comes to Kansas, it hasn’t mattered who was better. The Jayhawks come out on top.