All six seniors tried to take the court for the start of the game. The referee made one of them leave, and Todd Kappleman had to take a seat. For the first time this year the Kansas Jayhawks had a different starting lineup. Jeff Carey, Chris Zerbe, Lewis Harrison, Brett Ballard and Jeff Boschee took the opening tip and ran out to a 10-to-0 lead.

In fact, Kansas State did not score until the 16:48 mark of the first half. Right after that bucket KU coach Roy Williams restored the regular starters to the game. Those starters must have caught a case of senioritis, because they gave up 16 Wildcat points to their own seven, and just like that KU’s lead was down to one point.

Kansas then ran off the next 13 points, and the rest of the game returned to normal. Halftime score: Kansas 50, Kansas State 30.

Throughout the entire second half, KU’s lead did not dip below 20 points. Instead, the lead continued to grow, hitting 30 at the 16:48 mark. The lead flirted with 40 for a while, finally breaking through on a Jeff Boschee bomb at the 3:32 mark, topping off the lead at 42.

Kansas would only manage a Chris Zerbe basket after that, but the outcome had long since ceased to be in doubt.

Kirk Hinrich led Kansas with 24 points, followed closely by Jeff Boschee with 22. Drew Gooden scored 16 points and grabbed nine rebounds, Wayne Simien had 10 points with seven boards and Nick Collison added 12 points. Aaron Miles contributed with eight assists.

Next up for the Jayhawks is a season-ending trip to Missouri on Sunday, March 3.

See tonight’s 6News on Sunflower Cable channel 6, tomorrow’s Lawrence Journal-World and KUSports.com, for full coverage of tonight’s game.