Related pages Box score Self's comments Season stats Possession analysis advertisement

On a night where Kansas had an opportunity to dominate, the Jayhawks used a 12-2 push in the final three-and-a-half minutes; finally put away a feisty Colorado squad 75-54 Wednesday night on Senior Night at Allen Fieldhouse. Mario Chalmers led all scorers with 14 points, Brandon Rush had 13, C.J. Giles had 11 and Russell Robinson added 10 for KU. Marcus Hall led Colorado with 12 points, and team leading scorer Richard Roby was held to 10 points. The win moved KU back into a first place tie with Texas, who lost on a last second three by Acie Law and Texas A&M 46-43. Kansas still needs a victory over K-State and Oklahoma to beat Texas to secure the number one seed and the outright Big 12 regular season title. The Jayhawks were strong defensively in the first 18 minutes of the game, holding Colorado to a single field goal and five made free throws. Twice Colorado had shot clock violations, and a third was narrowly avoided. There were times when Colorado, playing for a number four seed and a first-round bye in the conference tournament, would rather have been anywhere else but the fieldhouse Wednesday night. After the three seniors, Christian Moody, Jeff Hawkins and Stephen Vinson, led the Jayhawks to a 10-2 start, Kansas scored but 32 first half points. "The plan was to try to win," said KU coach Bill Self. "That's what I told the seniors after the game.  You guys did a nice job but you'll remember this because you guys impacted the game as favorably as anybody else on our team did.  They were key performers tonight to give us a chance to win." Finally Colorado got untracked in the last two minutes of the half, and actually outscored KU over the next 18 minutes 41-31. When Julius Ashby hit a jumper with 4:08 remaining, the Kansas lead was down to eight, 58-50. Colorado seemed poised to pull off the comeback and perhaps the upset. "We played as good of defense in the first fifteen minutes as we have the entire year, except we did not rebound the ball," said Self. "I thought our defense was great.  We had a comfortable lead but we should have scored 8 to 10 more points.  Our offense was fairly inept.  We scored a good majority of our points off our defense and then the law of averages caught up with us and they started making some shots." Chalmers hit a three to re-expand the lead to 61-50 before Ashby hit another shot in the paint. Following the media timeout at 3:33, Julian Wright hit a couple of free throws, and then got a dunk off the first of three straight assists from Robinson. Robinson hit Giles for a dunk and Rush for a three, expanding the Jayhawk lead to 16 and leaving the rest of the night for the seniors to take a final bow. The Jayhawks were beaten on the boards by Colorado 45-38 and were awful from the free-throw line, hitting a mere 10 of 22 (45 percent). KU did hit 48 percent from beyond the arc (11-23). Had Colorado hit a decent percentage of threes and from the free-throw line it might have been a different game, but they went 7-15 from the line and 7-25 from distance. The bench scoring stat is always skewed on Senior Night, as the ‘starters’ don’t enter the game until, in tonight’s case anyway, six minutes in. Nevertheless, KU’s bench outscored the Buffalos 45-17. Darnell Jackson, whose presence off the bench has been invaluable this season, sat out the game due to the stomach flu. Vinson, after having two three-point tries rattle out in the first half, hit a trey with 10:55 left. The shot gave KU a 51-32 lead at the time. "I have been shooting well the last few days in practice, so I was confident going in.  My first couple were in and out.  It was a little bit of relief because I wanted to make it an even more special night.  It was the most fun because you make a shot and you are running back down the court towards where our families sit and I see my whole family hugging each other, and that is what makes it special -- getting to share moments like that with people that you love." Moody hit his only bucket with 12:49 left, giving KU a 48-30 lead. Hawkins went 2-4 from TreyLand, finishing his Allen career with a six-point game. Next is the regular season finale at Kansas State. With the win KU gets a share of the regular season title, and avenges an earlier loss to the Wildcats in Lawrence. Plus there’s the matter of the streak in Manhattan everyone is familiar with. "It was already going to be a big game whether there was a Big 12 race or not," said Vinson. “We know we are playing for something and they will be ready. Their fans will be as excited for that game as they have in many years because they have a lot on the line too. It's where we want to be. We want to be where we can control our own destiny and that is where we are right now." "We are going to try to have a couple of good practices and go get a ring." 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.