Sports THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
GAME DAY KANSAS VS. MINNESOTA MONDAY, JANUARY 25, 2016
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Minor leagues, major win Former KU pitcher wins Short-Season Reliever of year. BASEBALL | 5B
COMMENTARY
PERCENTAGE POINTS
PAGE 1B
K-State's Martin is helluva coach
BY TIM DWYER
tdwyer@kansan.com
I like Frank Martin. There, I said it. Before you burn this sports page in effigy, or storm the Kansan newsroom, or simply decide to not read the rest of this column, give me a couple moments to explain.
It may only take one quote.
Martin was asked how he would keep his Kansas State Wildcats motivated after knocking off No. 1 Texas in Manhattan on Monday night.
"If they don't come in and compete," he said, "I am going to destroy them."
That's the kind of quote that journalists love to hear.
Granted, it's not Arizona Cardinals coach Dennis Green asking you to crown the Bears' derriere, but it's still a phenomenal instance of a coach being completely straight with the media.
My love of Martin (as a coach, not in a man-crush kind of way) goes beyond his periodical Ivan Drago statements.
It also goes beyond my childish enjoyment of his resemblance to an extra from the Sopranos. (Someone said he also looks like a cast member from Jersey Shore at a 20-year reunion, which then made me squirt Coke out my nose with laughter.)
Those are both reasons to admire Martin, but I mostly like the guy because he can flat-out coach.
Most people assumed Kansas State was left for dead when Bob Huggins bailed in 2007 after one year to coach his alma mater, West Virginia. Instead, Martin has taken the program and resuscitated it after just a few years on the job.
Leading up to the Texas game, Martin didn't sleep for two days. He felt his team was underprepared, so he worked his tail off to reverse that.
And that's what he did. He coached his team to victory against the top-ranked team despite woeful performances from his two best players. He brought the best out of Jamar Samuels and Curtis Kelly, who combined for 37 points against the nation's best front court.
He took a fan base that only sold out when Kansas came around and worked them into an impassioned crowd that energized the Wildcats past Texas, even as the Longhorns rallied time and again.
As a result, he turned the Big 12 into a three-horse race.
After the game Martin met Bobby Knight, one of his idols and a man familiar with competitive fire. Knight told Martin that his offense needed work, and that he'd be happy to help if Martin called in the morning.
I'm sure he did. It's what a great competitor would do.
He's Frank Martin. And he must break you.
Edited by Taylor Bern
Baylor ends KU defensive streak
Junior center Cole Aldrich gets a hand in the face of Baylor guard LaceDarius Dunn. Dunn put up 22 points and shot five-for-eight from the three during Wednesday's game.
Weston White/KANSAN
BY COREY THIBODEAUX cthibodeaux@kansan.com twitter.com/c_thibodeaux
For the first time since junior center Cole Aldrich played his first game at Kansas, the Jayhawks allowed an opponent to make more than half their field goal attempts.
"Since I've been here, I don't think anybody has done that." Aldrich said after Wednesday's 81-75 victory against Baylor. "They just made some tough shots."
The Bears shot 52.1 percent from the field, ending a 92-game streak which the Jayhawks have held their opponents to less than 50 percent shooting. The last time it was done was Nov. 9, 2007, when Louisiana-Monroe shot 51 percent.
Senior guard Sherron Collins said even though they played well overall against Baylor, that stat didn't sit well.
"It is a little disappointing," he said. "I'm not going to say it isn't."
Baylor's LaceDarius Dunn finished with 27 points and Tweety Carter had 17 for the Bears. Despite junior guard Brady Morningstar's defensive effort against Dunn, Collins said, the Jayhawks could have done nothing to stop him. He added that if there was one weakness on this team, it was on the defense end.
"Brady played great defense on LaceDarius and he still had 27 points," Collins said. "Tweedy was still Tweety. We obviously can be better, but I thought we played a pretty good game."
However, coach Bill Self wasn't about to discredit his team's defense. Earlier this season, the jayhawks had games where they looked dominant, but Self said that that was the result of the opposition's failure to make shots.
That wasn't the case against Baylor.
"It's fool's gold when guys miss open looks," Self said. "They didn't get open looks tonight. We guarded them."
Since his team played so well, Self wasn't discouraged about allowing Baylor to get 52 percent
SEE MEN'S ON PAGE 5B
KANSAS VS.
IOWA STATE
1 p.m. Saturday in Ames,
Iowa.
The game will be shown
on ESPN.
TRACK AND FIELD
Transfer pole vaulters join team, make early mark
BY SAMANTHA ANDERSON sanderson@kansan.com
The Kansas track team is starting the season with three new female pole vaulters who transferred from different colleges. Each one is ready to make her own contribution.
Two of the vaulters became Jayhawks at the beginning of the fall semester, junior Jaci Perryman and sophomore Alex Colvin. Junior Tara Turnbull is joining the team this semester. Each girl has her own reasons for why starting over again at Kansas was the best choice for them.
Coming out of high school, Kansas was originally an option for Perryman. Tom Hays, vertical jumps coach, recruited her and she was very interested in the program and the opportunity to learn from Hays. However, the
distance from her hometown of Phoenix, Ariz., made the transition to Kansas a little too daunting, and Perryman decided to stay closer to home and attend Arizona.
Perryman graduated from Arizona a year early and because she redshirted her freshman year, she still had two more years of eligibility after graduation. She decided to come to Kansas to work on her graduate degree. This gave Perryman the opportunity to utilize her last two years of competition and finally learn from Coach Hays.
"I've always wanted to work with him," said Perryman. "I was excited to get this opportunity to do so. He definitely was a big factor in deciding to come here."
Perryman is already making a
Mike Gunnoe/KANSAN
SEE TRACK ON PAGE 5B
Sophomore Alex Colvin vaults during the Bill Easton Classic at Anschutz Pavilion on Jan. 8. Colvin, from Monument, Colo., transferred from San Diego State University and joined the Kansas track team in the fall.