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Summary The Jayhawks ran into an unusually hostile crown inside the Frank Erwin Center tonight for ESPN's Big Monday. The crowd's energy was reflected in an inspired effort by the Texas Longhorns, but it wasn't enough as Kansas prevailed 110-103 in overtime. It was a close and hard fought game throughout, with neither team able to mount a run to pull away. In the overtime Kansas was perfect from the field, including a pair of 3 pointers by Jeff Boschee, and Texas had no answer. Drew Gooden, after struggling and heading into intermission with 6 points and 3 fouls, ignited the Jayhawks after halftime, finishing with 28 points. Boschee tossed in 21 points while Kirk Hinrich, battling foul trouble that caused him to miss a third of the second half, added 14. Three Jayhawks had double-doubles as Aaron Miles, matched up against Texas super frosh T.J. Ford, scored 10 points and added 13 assists. Nick Collison scored 15 points and grabbed 12 rebounds, and Wayne Simien came off the bench to score 17 and snag 10 boards in just 19 minutes. When the smoke cleared, KU had 6 players in double figures in points, 26 assists as a team, and a tough road win over a quality opponent. Kansas improved its record to 22-2 and 11-0 in the Big 12. Analysis What did the Jayhawks do well? The first and most obvious is points in the paint. The Jayhawk big men (Gooden, Collison, and Simien) combined for 60 points. Kansas was able to enter the ball into the post any time they wanted to and Texas, without senior Chris Owens (out for the year with a knee injury) just didn't have the personnel to stop them. The Jayhawks had nice interior screening and motion tonight that opened up passing lanes to the post. Once the KU forwards caught it down there it was over. The second positive is protection of the basketball. Though it didn't seem like it at times, Kansas finished the night with just 13 turnovers (only 6 for the starting guards). That's remarkable considering the pace of this game. The Jayhawks did a good job of protecting the ball, shot it reasonably well, and scored a pile of points as a result. Finally, how about the baseline inbounds plays? KU often monotonously inbounds the ball, setting many intricate picks before inbounding to a fairly well guarded guy in the corner or lobbing it to near mid-court. Tonight, Kansas scored easy buckets on lobs to the rim to Gooden and Hinrich (I counted at least 4) out of that play. You'd figure that Texas would seal that off after the first one and be content to allow the simple entry to the wing, but they never were. The Horns continued to defend those screens the same way all night, and Kansas exploited it. What did the Jayhawks not do well? Two glaring things jump out at me here. First, the rebounding on the defensive end was not good enough. Second, KU struggled at times to find the Texas shooters on the perimeter. This turned into a double whammy, because when the defense would coerce a perimeter miss, the rebound often went to the Horns, and they'd reset their possession. In the end Texas made 10-21 from behind the arc and snagged 17 offensive rebounds. Credit T.J. Ford for getting Texas open jumpers. Miles did an admirable job defensively, but Ford is very quick and did a nice job in penetrating and finding the open man (finishing with 11 assists). Collison was the only bright spot on the defensive glass, grabbing 10. No one else on the team had more than 4. One cause of the rebounding problems was the need for the Jayhawks to play zone on defense. Kansas played zone almost exclusively for the first 11 minutes of the second half to protect Gooden. It was certainly the right thing to do, and Texas' inside people found holes and grabbed offensive boards out of it. Kansas fans got a peek at the answer to the dreaded question, "What happens when Gooden and Hinrich get into foul trouble?" Tonight, the answer was HUGE minutes by Simien and Brett Ballard. Simien's statistical line (above) was just awesome given the limited minutes he played. Wayne's offensive philosophy at times seemed to be run to the front of the rim, wait for the pass, dunk. I thought it was a good one. Ballard played 6 minutes, mostly with Hinrich on the bench from about the 12 minute mark to the 5 minute mark in the second half. Ballard took some turns defending Ford, hit a big 3 that broke a tie, didn't turn the ball over, and gave the Jayhawks exactly what they needed with Kirk out. Great contributions tonight by Brett. T.J. Ford vs. Aaron Miles, Chapter I: A lot was written about Ford in the press before this game (rightfully so), and Miles answered all the questions in the classy fashion we'd expect from a KU player. Tonight's lines: Ford 16 points on 5-16 shooting, 11 assists, and 5 turnovers; Miles 10 points on 4-10 shooting (two banked jumpers that I'm sure he called, but I was sitting too far from the court to hear :-), 13 assists, and 3 turnovers. I was tremendously impressed with the way that Aaron stepped up and played in this game against his much heralded freshman counterpart. I'm kind of hoping these two teams meet again in the Big 12 tournament. I just don't want to have to wait until next year to see these two ultra-quick point guards do battle again. I guess the best thing to take from the game is that it was another example of this team standing up to adversity and prevailing. Boschee's pair of 3s in the overtime were huge, and not exactly the uncontested variety. Each team member that was on the floor did his part to pick up the slack for the foul trouble of the big guns. This game was a tremendous team effort. When Boschee went to the foul line, the Erwin Center was as loud as I've ever heard it (in the few times I've been). None of KU's youngsters seemed bothered by it at all. Even the celebration was minimal after they'd pulled it out. The Jayhawks were in a tight game against a tough opponent in a (at the end, at least) loud gym and never lost their quiet confidence or their "expect to win" mentality. They played hard, fought through tough circumstances, and traveled back to Lawrence victorious. Nice win.

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Rock Chalk.... Robert