Volume 126 Issue 48
kansan.com
Monday. November 18, 2013
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAW
COMMENTARY Win reignites the Jayhawk spirit
Garrett pretz comes to Potter Lake twice a week to relax. On Saturday he came looking for a goal post.
for it. He wouldn't find them. They had submerged below the surface, but the remnants left behind of Kansas' 31-19 win over West Virginia will stay. The memory of breaking a 27-game conference losing streak is not going anywhere.
It will stay with the students, particularly the upperclassmen who haven't celebrated a conference win in three years. It will stay with alumni who have spent oodles of money supporting a struggling program. Mostly, it will stay with the players who have been injured, bruised, put down, teased and more.
The players haven't asked for this — to be a laughing stock of a program. They asked for a chance to make their dreams of playing big time college football come true.
There have been coaching changes, suspensions and even "piles of crap." But for once, on one fall Saturday, these players, our classmates, were surrounded by a group of ecstatic students, cheering them on.
Their job is mostly thankless. The play a gruesome sport. They get beat up. And they had lost 27 consecutive conference games.
There was the Texas game last season, where Case McCoy's late touchdown pass led the Longhorns to an unlikely come from behind victory. Or the Baylor game two seasons ago, where Robert Griffin III and the Bears had a 21-point fourth quarter comeback to win.
Finally, the Kansas football team was the highlight. Embarrassment, even if it was brief, had been lifted.
It's not easy to be on the wrong end of highlights for 27 conference games over the last three years.
Sure, this is nothing more than a 3-7 football team beating a 4-7 football team at home.
But after all of the losses, even small accomplishments like single-digit halftime deficits were celebrated. This time, they celebrated a win. The final score with the lavihawks ahead.
Minutes after the clock hit zero, Massachusetts Street seemed the same. Business went on. Pedestrians calmly walked to their destinations. Drive a few minutes to the south, and the story is different.
University students who are known to tailgate before the game and sleep during it were alive. The student ghetto was filled with ongoing parties. The Wheel overflowed like their pitchers. And the Hawk was, well, the Hawk, with students hollering from the front porch.
And then there's that goal post that hadn't been touched in years. A symbol of Kansas tradition brought back from the dead. 27 games, no more.
Weis was drenched in water. Students surrounded him and then climbed those goal post. They tore it down, and marched it out of the stadium toward Potter Lake. Some swam, most didn't. Nobody cared, their football team had won.
That's what led Garrett Pretz to Potter Lake a few hours after the garne. The chaos had ceased, and he just wanted to see the symbol of victory. He had been going to games since he was four years old. Pretz, a freshman from Andover, Kan., found his family after rushing the field. He didn't get to toss the goal post into Potter Lake. He didn't get to see them hours after. It didn't matter.
All that did matter was that the goal post was there. Anchored to the bottom of the lake by a 27-game losing streak.
Edited by James Ogden
STORMING THE FIELD
ANDY LARKIN/KANSAN
Senior running back James Sims runs away from West Virginia defenders on his way to a career-high 219 yards rushing on Saturday. Sims had touchdown runs of 2,3 and 68 yards in the game.
IT'S FINALLY OVER
Goal post comes down after Kansas' first conference victory since 2010
IMAX GOODWIN
mgoodwin@kansan.com
Cheers of joy erupted from Memorial Stadium on Saturday after a 31-19 victory against West Virginia.
At Potter Lake, pieces of the south goal post protruded from the water as students and fans celebrated the end of a 27-game Big 12 losing streak.
Moments earlier, Charlie Weis had been right in the middle of a crowd at midfield, soaking wet from an ice-water bath, while singing the alma mater with students and players.
"You know, I got kids sticking phones in my face and everything like that, but it was worth it because it's been awhile since the student body got a chance to enjoy it too, and I'm happy for them as well." Weis said.
It was the Big 12 win for Weis at Kansas. If the losing streak had continued through the end of the season, it would have reached a Big 12 record of 30 games.
But Weis said his enjoyment comes from seeing the happiness of his players.
"Let's start with the kids that have been here for five years and gone through multiple coaches. Those are the guys I feel the best for. I also feel good for all of our students and fans who have endured those years." Weis said.
Defensive lineman Kevin Young is one of those seniors who has been in the program for five years. Saturday was the third conference win of Young's time at Kansas, and second he has played in.
"I guess the best way you can put it is like when you're a little kid on Christmas morning." Young said.
The Kansas coaches had the receivers spread farther out across the field, opening up more of the middle for running lanes.
The Jayhawks won the game by playing to their strengths. After allowing a West Virginia touchdown on the first drive of the game, the Kansas defense held the Mountaineers scoreless on 12 straight possessions.
On offense, the Jayhawks were carried by senior running back James Sims.
Sims rushed for a career best 219 yards, as well as three touchdowns on 22 carries.
"Our object was to spread them out... if they had five in the box, just hand the ball off," Sims said. "We took advantage of the five man box and we gashed them with it."
Sims had a 62-yard run to set up a touchdown in the second quarter, and then improved upon that with a 68-yard run for a touchdown. Sims knew the whole way he was free to run for the score.
"I looked up at the lumbotron and saw no one behind me," Sims said with a smile.
That play came with 39 seconds left in the second quarter and made it a 17-7 game before halftime.
Weis said he had a sense that a hole could open up with that play. "There was one play that we had from an unbalanced formation, that I thought could get us a chunk, and then if we got a chunk we could call a timeout and try to go to the end zone," Weis said. "And the chunk was a lot bigger than I was expecting."
Most of the coaching decisions made by Weis and his staff worked in the team's favor. The running lanes were opened up when the
offense spread the field.
The screen passes that West Virginia used to drive down the field in the first quarter were shut down later in the game as the secondary played closer to the line of scrimmage and caved in on those short passes.
"Once they took those plays away, against the wind, that pretty well shut them down," Weis said.
The other coaching move that worked out for the Jayhawks was starting freshman quarterback Montell Cozart for the first time this season. Cozart displayed poise and composure on the field.
Though he was just five-for-12 with 61 passing yards, Cozart also ran for 59 yards.
Despite his team's 2-7 record going into Saturday's game, and the fact that they had already lost any chance of going to a bowl game. Weis said he thought the game against West Virginia was important for the team's morale.
"It was a big concern for me that if we lost this game today, it would be a large struggle going through the rest of the season," Weis said. "We needed some momentum and we got that today."
The Jayhawks will play at Iowa State with a road losing streak to break, but all that matters for now is the streak that Kansas halted on Saturday and the hope that it provides for the final two games of the season.
Less than an hour after the game was over, players were already talking about how the win would give the team a boost as they go into practice this week.
Weis gave the players permission to go out and celebrate the win on Saturday night, as long as they were careful to stay out of trouble. But as for Weis himself, he said his job as a coach to remain cynical and look at what the Jayhawks could continue to improve upon.
But the head coach took a moment as he congratulated players leaving the field to glance at the students and fans as they began the successful effort to tear down the goal post.
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
Sharpshooting Jayhawks defeat Creighton
"Good for the students," Weis said.
Edited by Paige Lytle
STELLA LIANG
sliang@kansan.com
Kansas (3-0) held on for a 74-66 victory against Creighton (2-2) after shooting well from the field, especially early. The Jayhawks ended up shooting 61 percent from the field, including 75 percent in the first half against the Bluejays from the Big East.
The Bluejays jumped to an early 10-5 lead, but junior Chelsea Gardner took over and helped the Jayhawks take the lead for good in the middle of the first half. Gardner, who ended up with team-highs of 24 points and eight rebounds, was 5-5 from the field with nine minutes left to play in the first half.
Junior forward Chelsea Gardner grabs a rebound in Kansas' 74-66 victory over the Crissi昂蓝翌 sunday afternoon. Gardner finished with 24 points.
Gardner was left alone outside of the paint and showed off her outside shooting. She hit two jump shots in the first half, which she said she doesn't get to do often.
JAMES HOYT/KANSAN
Y
"I feel like I started the game with a lot of energy," Gardner said. "I had a lot of momentum
The Bluejays cut the lead to three by halftime, but the Jayhawks kept up their efficient shooting coming out of the locker room at halftime. They built up their lead to 16 with 8:33 left to play.
plays and getting down the court and knocking down jump shots."
This time, junior Asia Boyd and sophomore Lamaria Cole led the charge. Boyd had 19 points off 6-8 shooting and Cole had 14, including a couple of speedy, acrobatic lavups.
On one play, Cole sped down the court and found a streaking Boyd who beat the defender and made a lawup.
"We played fast, and Asia tried to run with [Lamaria] and got ahead," Kansas coach Bonnie Hendrickson said. "It's great that [Lamaria is] that fast, but it's beautiful when we get some people to try and run with her."
Creighton had a strong advantage on the offensive glass. They collected 12 offensive rebounds which gave them plenty of extra opportunities to score.
"We fought back," Creighton sophomore机关 Marissa Janning said. "We limited their runs for the most part, but we didn't make our own runs."
Janning finished the game with a team-high 22 points, most of which came early. Janning was the only starter for the Bluejays who wasn't a senior, and she leads the team in scoring through the first four games of their season.
"I like their team maybe more than I thought," Creighton coach Jim Flanier said. "You look at losing Goodrich, Davis and Engelman, but you take a kid like Boyd who was a really good high school player and sat on the bench, and Cole [is] the same thing, those kids will get better as the year goes on."
Creighton made a run late, through plenty of fouls and free throws, cutting the lead down to single digits with less than five minutes to play. But the Bluejays ran out of time, and the Jayhawks made timely baskers. With two minutes to play Gardner made a
Vol
Henrickson said this victory was important for the Jayhawk's future. Creighton, which is in its first year as a member of the Big East conference, has made back-to-back NCAA tournament appearances. They were picked
momentum-stopping layup, and made the lead seem comfortable again.
to finish second in the Big East. The Jayhawks also defeated the Bluejays last season.
1
"I have to be honest with you, I'm really proud of our kids," Henrickson said. "[Creighton] is a really good basketball team."
— Edited by Evan Dunbar
1