Big 12 ‘Beatdown’: Kansas Basketball as TCU beats 83-60 at Allen Fieldhouse

It may not have been as lopsided as TCU-Georgia in the College Football Playoff title game earlier this month, but it was close.

And this time, it was Coin’s winning side, the Horned Frogs, when Jamie Dixon’s club stepped into Allen Fieldhouse on Saturday afternoon to beat No. 2 Kansas, 83-60. With a few minutes left he leaves the KU fans.

The loss was the fourth-biggest home loss in Allen Fieldhouse history, ahead of a 25-point loss to Texas in 2021, a 24-point loss to Iowa State in 1973, and a 24-point loss to Kansas. Only 2 points behind the point loss. 1964 state. It was also his second straight win for the Jayhawks during the nightmare Big 12 conference play.

“It was a beatdown,” KU coach Bill Self said after the loss that dropped the second-place Jayhawks 16-3 overall and 5-2 in Big 12 plays. “The way they chewed their gum, the way they tied their shoes, everything they did today was perfect.

TCU (15-4, 4-3) caught fire with super sharp focus and elite focus. Horned Frogs head his coach Jamie Dixon said after the win that he thinks playing KU played a big role here last year. Likewise, of his 15 shots in the first he made 13.

That kind of aggressive production from both the Frogs’ experienced starting fives and athletic bench turned a 14-13 TCU lead into a 33-13 nightmare deficit for Kansas. The Horned Frogs’ biggest run in a complete game was 19-0 at that point, featuring TCU’s defense and Jayhawks’ offensive incompetence that kept Jayhawks scoreless for over five minutes. rice field.

It was visitor layup after layup, Kansas turnover after turnover, and a series of highlight reel buckets by TCU.

One came from reserve guard Shahada Wells, who put TCU up 28-13 with his steals and hammer dunks. He scored a career-high 17 points on his 7/8 shooting, compared to his 39 points at TCU, only on a day Kansas reserved, where he managed only 8 points. I surpassed the KU bench myself.

Another was from preseason Big 12 Player of the Year, Mike Miles Jr. His circus shot flipped over his head from under the rim, putting TCU up by 20.

TCU’s first-half lead eventually reached 22 points, but that didn’t stop the Jayhawks from fighting back. An 11-0 KU run saw him cut TCU’s lead to 37-26 as he went into Kansas’ locker room at halftime by 10 points.

“10 was manageable,” Self said after the game. “But I thought it was a bit like playing like there was a 10-point play in the back pocket instead of just trying to win possession.”

Picking up where they left off in the first half, TCU’s offense quickly made sure even 10-point play wasn’t a problem.

The Frogs started the second half pushing their lead to 55–40 in the first 3:45 of the final frame, and the Jayhawks never came within 13 after that, and most of the second half was just a formality.

TCU continued to play hard and kept attacking. And the Kansas defense continued to give the visitors whatever they wanted, even as they struggled on offense.

All of this came as TCU big man Eddie Lumpkin Jr. suffered a sprained ankle near the end of the first half that left him severely restricted throughout the second half. The 6-foot-11-inch, 263-pound Lumpkin continued to play, essentially playing on one foot while hitting several offensive rebounds and he scored two points.

The only time TCU nearly gave up was when they started seeing Kansas fans applying for exits. The first sign of that came in his timeouts against his eight-and-under media in the second half.

“We knew we had a game when we saw it,” Miles said.

Saturday’s win was the first win at Allen Fieldhouse for TCU, who are trailing the best series ever with Kansas 24-4 and 10-1 at Allen Fieldhouse. However, the Frogs now have won two of his last four matchups between the two programs.

“When I got here, all I heard was that almost every school in the Big 12 had never won,” Dixon said after Saturday’s win. “And finally I got this one. This one is the hardest.”

The fact that the home team made TCU so easy on Saturday put the Jayhawks in a dump after the game.

This was also different from the Kansas loss earlier this week. In one of them, the Jayhawks fought, competed, and at least played hard enough to give themselves a chance to win both at the end of regulation and in overtime.

“Today they pretty much had what they wanted,” said KU Jr. Jalen Wilson, who followed a 38-point effort at K-State with 30 points on Saturday. “You have to take pride in your defense and your stopping. It’s been two games in a row where the team was too comfortable with us.”

The Jayhawks shoot just 45.2% and shoot 33% from three-point range, with starters Grady Dick, Dafan Harris Jr. and KJ Adams going 23-4 combined. But Self, who was just 17th behind Self in KU’s home building after the loss, said it wasn’t his KU offense that bothered him on Saturday. He said pride, defense, attention to detail in scout reports, and taking things “seriously” were all bigger concerns.

“I worry they’re guarding someone more than I’m scoring,” Self said. “I think if you worry about the right things, you get more points. “He did a great job defensively. Other than that, I didn’t realize there are just too many individuals on either side who really do a lot.”

Self added: “We’ve played a lot of games in buildings like this, but somehow[we]have seen other teams shoot at a lower percentage in the second half and come back on our way and shoot I can’t hit it, but I have a second or third chance and I can beat those three, and I didn’t have that at all today.”

Next, Kansas will travel to Waco, Texas on Monday to face the Baylor Bears at 8 p.m. on ESPN’s Big Monday.