Volume 124 Issue 135
Monday, April 16, 2012
kansan.com
The Ben McLemore experience will officially and finally begin.
But the player I'm most excited to watch is one that dressed in street clothes at every Kansas game last season: Ben McLemore.
In all honesty, though, Self didn't sign McLemore to be a lockdown defender.
McLemore will throw a couple dunks down. Sleepy eyes in Allen Fieldhouse will suddenly open wide.
The first time we'll get to see McLemore in action on James Naismith Court is Oct. 12 for Late Night in the Phog. The players will jog out of the tunnel and form layup lines. Those layup lines will slowly evolve into dunk lines.
Jeff Withey and Elijah Johnson: Two guys who showed flashes of stardom during Kansas' tournament run, will form the core. Travis Releford will play his old-man game, pivoting around defenders and locking down the other team's best scorer.
Never too early. right?
COMMENTARY
The next big star for Self
It's the middle of April in Lawrence, and we all know what that means: It's time to talk about next year's basketball team.
Incoming freshman Perry Ellis is a McDonald's All-American. Bill Self didn't have one last year. Anrio Adams, Andrew White and Jamari Traylor could also get minutes next year.
He's 6-foot-5, weighs 185 pounds and has made YouTube hits out of more than a couple hopeless post defenders trying to block his dunk. He doesn't really jump. He floats, then falls back to Earth.
Edited by Max Lush
One of my friends got to watch McLemore in a practice one day and came away convinced that he had the most NBA Draft potential of anyone in the gym. And yes, Thomas Robinson was at practice that day.
On an NBA TV segment on Friday night, former Kansas coach Larry Brown linked McLemore's athletic ability during Kansas practices to Russell Westbrook's while he was at UCLA.
To earn starter's minutes, McLemore will need to work on his defense. He told the Lawrence Journal-World a week ago that he struggled to keep up with Tyshawn Taylor in early practices.
McLemore may not be as talented, but if a former NBA coach looks at McLemore and connects him to Westbrook — one of the 10 most talented players in the NBA — that's incredible news for Kansas fans.
Some people got to see his athletic ability in action during practices this season.
CLAIRE HOWARD/KANSAN
Alex DeLeon, a junior center from Woodland Hills, Calif., takes a crack at the ball during Kansas' game against Texas Tech at Hogwild Ballpark on Sunday afternoon. The Jawhays came through with a 5-3 win marking the end of their eight-game losing streak.
STREAK SNAPPED
ANDREW JOSEPH
ajoseph@kansan.com
The victory snapped a season-long eight-game losing streak and improved the Jayhawks to 13-23 and 3-9 in the Big 12. After showing signs of improvement in Saturday's 6-4 loss to the Aggies, the Kansas offense put together a complete performance on Sunday.
The Kansas baseball team salvaged the final game of the weekend's series against No. 2 Texas A&M with a 5-3 victory at Hoglund Ballpark.
"I'm hoping this will be the one that gets us over the hump and takes our confidence to the next level," coach Ritch Price said. "It really starts with our experienced guys today."
Junior pitcher Thomas Taylor struggled with his command in the first inning, and after a Matt Juengel RBI single, the Jayhawks found themselves in the typical position of playing from behind.
Texas A&M's starting pitching staff dominated the Kansas hitters for much of the weekend as the Jayhawks did not score a run in the series' first 15 innings. With undefeated Rafael Pineda on the mound for Texas A&M, the Jayhawks jumped to a 2-1 lead following a pair of basesloaded singles from senior third baseman Zac Elgie and junior second baseman Jordan Dreiling.
"It was good to stop them right away," Dreiling said. "When you're playing a team like that and give them a couple runs, next thing you know it'll be 6-0. It was huge to go out there and take the momentum back."
Dreiling went 2-for-4 on Saturday, and he followed up with another multi-hit effort on Sunday. The offense continued to put pressure on Texas A&M, and an RBI single from senior catcher James Stanfield in the sixth inning extended the lead to 4-1. Kansas scored another run in the seventh, heading into ninth with a 5-1 lead.
Kansas' patience at the plate increased drastically on Sunday. Kansas batters walked just four times in the previous two games
against Texas A&M, but the Jayhawks collected seven walks on Sunday. The improved plate discipline forced Texas A&M to go to the bullpen often, using six reliefs pitchers after Pineda's five innings of work.
"We laid off the off-speed pitches a whole lot more today, and we were much more selective," Stanfield said. "In the end, that gets us our pitch that we need to hit."
Texas A&M holds the No. 2 ranking for a reason, and the
Aggies nearly completed a ninth- inning comeback against junior closer Tanner Poppe. Texas A&M scored two runs in the ninth inning off a Jacob House RBI single and a wild pitch.
With two outs and the bases loaded, senior catcher Troy Stein had an opportunity to give Texas A&M the lead, but Poppe threw a fastball right by Stein for the game-ending strikeout. The Hoglund Ballpark crowd of 1,103 and the Kansas dugout erupted as the frustrating losing streak
met its end.
"I don't even know how to explain it," Stanfield said. "When I caught that last pitch for strike three, it was like a weight vest just fell on the ground."
The Jayhawks will look to capitalize this week against St. Mary and Baker - two NAIA schools in Kansas - before traveling to Austin, Texas, to face the No. 23 Longhorns.
— Edited by Pat Strathman
TENNIS
Freshman Maria Belen Ludena returns a serve to her Bradley opponent on Saturday's match-up at the Jayhawk Tennis Center.
Last match for Big 12 victory
CORBIN MIHELIC
cmihelic@kansan.com
KANSAN FILE PHOTO
One more chance.
If the Kansas women's tennis team plans on winning a Big 12 dual match in 2012, it only has one more match to do so. Losses over the weekend to a pair of the league's weaker teams surely didn't help matters for the lavhawks.
The Jayhaws (9-10, 0-8 in the Big 12) dropped road matches to No. 45 Missouri, 4-3, and Iowa State, 6-1, moving them to the bottom of the conference standings.
"We've just got to keep fighting," sophomore Claire Dreyer said. "I know it's discouraging looking at that, but we just seriously need to start getting at it. We're capable of doing this. We just have to believe for real."
Kansas snagged the doubles point early in Friday's match against rival Mizzou, sealed by a 9-8 (5) tiebreaker victory at the No.2 spot for sophomore Paulina Los and freshman Maria Belen Ludueña. Junior Monica Pezzotti and sophomore Dylan Windom won had the other doubles win, an 8-4 rout.
Friday match was the first time in nearly four weeks where the Jayhawks won the doubles point, and it was the team's first in Big 12 play this season.
"The most important point is the doubles point," junior Victoria Khanevskaya said. "After getting the doubles point, it's always easier to go to the singles matches because of confidence."
But the Tigers bounced back
quickly, reeling off four straight singles wins to own what may be the final tennis chapter of the Border Showdown rivalry.
Windom and Dreyer's wins at the No. 4 and 5 spots only made the final score appear more competitive.
KU took the doubles point yet again in the 6-1 loss to Iowa State, but failed to pull out any singles matches. Before the match, the Cyclones were the only other team in
the big 12 without a dual match victory in conference play.
The Jayhawks' final opportunity to win a regular season conference match will come Saturday against the Kansas State Wildcats in Manhattan. Kansas State is one of three Big 12 teams not ranked, along with Kansas and Iowa State. The Wildcats currently sit at 3-5 in conference dual play.
"We have to win," Khanevskaya
Edited by Max Lush
said. "We cannot lose this match because it's winnable. We're always able, but I would say with this match we must win."
Five days later, all Big 12 teams will head to College Station, Texas to compete in this year's Big 12 Championships, which run from April 26-29.
FOOTBALL
Kansas adds another Notre Dame player
Former Notre Dame linebacker Anthony McDonald announced Friday that he is transferring to Kansas. Since McDonald sat out his freshman season and is graduating with a degree in sociology from
Notre Dame in May, he will be eligible to play for the Jayhawks immediately.
McDonald is the second player who
McDonald
played under Kansas coach Charlie Weis at Notre Dame to come to Kansas. He will be joining former Notre Dame and high school teammate senior quarterback Dayne Crist when he arrives in June.
McDonald played in the U.S. Army All-American bowl following his senior year of high school, and Scout.com ranked him as the eighth-best middle linebacker in his class. During his four seasons with Notre Dame, McDonald played in 28 games. He played in all 12 games of the 2009 season, and he played 11 games in 2010, but McDonald appeared in only four games in 2011 because of injuries. In one of McDonald's game appearances last season, he recorded three tackles against Navy.
By adding McDonald, Weis' first recruiting class at Kansas has 25 players, 14 of whom transferred from another NCAA institution or a junior college.
Ethan Padway