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On the day the Booth Family Hall of Athletics officially opened, the Jayhawks turned in a hall-of-fame performance Saturday at Allen Fieldhouse. Brandon Rush scored the first five points of the game and 10 of the first 12 Jayhawk points. From there Kansas never looked back, finishing with a 96-54 rout of Nebraska. Rush and senior guard Jeff Hawkins shared high-scorer honors with 17 points each for KU, while Aleks Maric tossed in 12 for the Cornhuskers. The margin of defeat was the largest Nebraska coach Barry Collier has suffered since taking over for Danny Nee in Lincoln six seasons ago. KU shot a blistering 72 percent from the field, including hitting seven of 10 three-point shots, en route to 51 first half points and a 21 point halftime advantage. KU wound up hitting just under 60 percent from the field for the game, and 11 of 19 from TreyLand overall. KU began the game two of six from the free throw line, and finished 11 of 18. At the under 12 minute media timeout in the first half, KU led 15-7 but there was a sense the Jayawks could smell blood. Over the next four minutes KU outscored the Huskers 15-8 to double the score at 30-15. During the run KU got eight points from Russell Robinson and five from Hawkins. Hawkins would go on to have a perfect six-for six day from the floor; five of those shots were treys. Robinson, Darnell Jackson and Julian Wright would join Rush and Hawkins in double figures; Robinson finished with 13 and Jackson and Wright came off the bench to tally 13 and 12 respectively. "Offense looks a lot better when you make shots," Jayhawk coach Bill Self said, "and we certainly did that as well as we have all year." Meanwhile Nebraska didn’t play well on either end of the floor, but credit KU’s pressure defense for converting 23 Husker turnovers into fast break opportunities. "Playing good defense gives us confidence on the offensive end," said Robinson. "It leads to easy baskets and helps us get into the flow of the game. Pressure on the ball can create momentum for us." Offensively, the Huskers had only one more basket from the floor (17) than made free throws (16); a tough day by any standard. The Huskers needed a big game from guard Joe McCray, but he missed six of eight three point shots en route to a six point game. These wide swings in statistics hide a certain reality: Nebraska is a pretty good basketball team. "We played well and we caught Nebraska on a day when they didn't play that well," coach Self said. "This is the same team that went to Manhattan and won and beat Oklahoma." Kansas did continue to struggle with ball handling, turning the ball over 11 times in the first 12 minutes of the game. "That has been one of biggest weaknesses of our team, taking care of the basketball," commented Self. "Against Missouri, we had 11 turnovers -- 10 at halftime -- and then we did a fabulous job of taking care of the ball in the second half.   Tonight was very similar." Kansas wound up with 17 turnovers for the day. The Jayhawk frontcourt players weren’t much of a force in the game. Sasha Kaun and Christian Moody started the game for KU, but only had six points (including two Moody free throws) and seven rebounds between them. C.J. Giles didn’t play until mop-up time. "We have gone from a guard-scoring team, to a big guy-scoring team, and now back to a guard-scoring team," said Self. "We have to get our big guys to be a presence and to give us points inside.  Darnell (Jackson) did the best job of our big guys tonight." Jayhawk reserve Matt Kleinmann got in the game with six minutes left, hitting two shots in his six minutes of action. Only Micah Downs sat out, and that was due to illness. "I was really pleased with our guys," Self said. "I thought everyone who played substantial minutes really contributed." This was a great confidence builder. We’d like to think sooner or later a game like this would come to pass, and it’s nice to win big after the losses to K-State and Missouri. If KU continues to play as they did Saturday, their place in the NCAA’s will be secure. However this is but one game, and Self knows "it is a tough, tough week for the Jayhawks." "It is great that we were able to bounce back today after a disappointment, but we are going to go play a Texas A&M team that is tough-as-nails.  They should be 5-0 in the league.  And then we go to Ames, and everybody knows how tough it is to win at Ames." Mark Howe is a freelance writer currently residing in Milford, IN. He is a former ticket taker, usher and security worker at Allen Fieldhouse, and can be reached at mhowe (at) rockchalk (dot) com.