By Cory Hedgepeth
Twitter @Surfelport
The Jayhawks are just coming off a big win in the Big Apple, despite their 22 turnovers. That’s both the good and the bad. Good being that they can win even when they make silly passes under pressure. The bad being that they make silly passes under pressure. Pressure being playing in front of Jason Sudeikis, of course. Anyone missing Selby yet?
Next up is the Colorado State University Rams. They are 4-2 this year and honestly, their not really that good. But they’re not awful. They are kind of like watching Larry King Live, its worth watching even though you know its not really ever going to get anywhere. They don’t matchup well with the Jayhawks.
CSU is from the Mountain West Conference, where they expected to be more competitive this year. But at 4-2 (4-3 staring them in the face) and some notable weaknesses, things might not work out as planned. The conference is typically dominated by BYU, San Diego State, UNLV and New Mexico.
As a team, they have some good numbers, like their high, yet deceiving field goal percentage of 54%. It looks efficient on the outside, but most of that’s just because Travis Franklin spends a good deal of his time at the line, where he doesn’t always shoot well. As a team they are shooting 66% at the line, which is somewhat inflated as they did shoot much better against rival Colorado last night, making 35 of 41, only to come back to their reality and lose the game at the end by missing 4 of their last 8 (previous to this game it was 52%). So really, their shooting efficiency is deceiving and commonly exploited (like last night). They also haven’t been great from long range. They shot a dismal 35% last year. The main threats from long range for this year will be Andre McFarland and Wes Eikmeier. Andre is shooting 42%, Wes is at right at 35%. So its still not much of a punch even if Andre gets hot, seeing he only shoots a couple of times a game.
Andy Ogide is the main threat offensively. He’s the team leader in scoring (17.5 ppg) and rebounding (8.0 rpg). He shoots just under 50% from the field and just over 50% at the line. If you add those two stats together, they equal sending him to the line is a good idea. Maybe he shoots free throws with the same style for which he dunks?
Awkward!
Jesse Carr will be at the guard position. He shoots 50% from the line. Ok, that’s enough, I am going to stop talking about free throws with this team, lets all just assume they miss most of them and move on with this column, I have places to be.
Ok, I don’t have anywhere to be but you get the idea.
What do the Rams have going for them? They do have veteran scorers in Franklin, Ogide and Dorian Green. They are also not far from great skiing. This game is a bad romance. I expect KU to dominate from start to finish.
I’m out.
