Simien settles into familiar stall

Edward Jones Dome brings back good memories for Kansas

St. Louis ? Wayne Simien dropped his gear into a familiar Edward Jones Dome locker stall Thursday afternoon.

“It’s the same one I had two years ago. It feels like I was just here yesterday,” said Simien, Kansas University’s junior power forward.

He’s happy to be back at the site of KU’s first-and second-round victories over Holy Cross and Stanford his freshman season.

“We walked in, nobody had taken it, I remembered it was a good spot and moved in,” added Simien, who insists he’s not the superstitious type.

Simien and his teammates ran through a light, 30-minute shootaround before about 500 fans at the dome, shortly after holding a harder, two-hour practice at Saint Louis University.

“This brings back good memories,” said third-year sophomore Jeff Hawkins of the Jones Dome. “We were able to win two here and (ultimately) advance to the Final Four.”

As far as the background being different in a dome, freshman J.R. Giddens said it was no big deal.

“The court is the same length. I’m pretty sure the shots will go in like regular,” Giddens said.

Freshman David Padgett never has played in a dome.

“The biggest building I played in was Cleveland last year for the McDonald’s game, and I didn’t play (because of injury),” Padgett said of Gund Arena, the home of the NBA’s Cavaliers.

Padgett, who sprained his left ankle at Tuesday’s practice, practiced Thursday and said his ankle was fine.

Kansas' Wayne Simien, left and KU's assistant director of media relations, Laura Lesko, motor through the tunnels of the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, Mo.

Players intent: KU junior Keith Langford says the Jayhawks are on a mission, the year after Roy Williams bolted KU for North Carolina.

“I can’t speak for Illinois (which like KU had a coaching change in offseason), but as for ourselves we want to show that a lot of what we accomplished in the past two years was us and not just all what coach Williams did. Granted, he was a big part of that (two Final Fours), and we looked up to him, but we really take pride in how we performed the past couple of years.”

More 5-on-8 talk: Most questions asked at Thursday’s news conference were about coach Bill Self having KU’s starters go against eight players at a time at practice to simulate UAB’s pressure.

“The only other team I can remember doing that against was Arkansas. When we were at Oral Roberts, we used to practice against seven and eight every time we played Arkansas,” Self said.

Giddens said practices had been especially physical.

“Coach Self told Stephen Vinson, ‘Steve, don’t let him catch it and foul him,'” Giddens said. “I said, ‘How’s that anything different than usual? Steve always fouls.”

Omar Wilkes has been one of the eight defenders.

“If you put eight sixth graders out there, it’d be hard,” Wilkes said. “It will mess you up.”

Home cooking?: KU senior Jeff Graves, on the fact Kansas likely will have the majority of the fans in the stands tonight.

“I think it’s always good to play in front of your fans,” Graves said. “The fans really like this because we’re not far from Kansas City. I’ll have a lot of family coming in for the game. Hopefully, it’ll be to our advantage.”

Nevada here, too: Padgett, who hails from Reno, Nev., doesn’t expect Nevada’s fans to be cheering for him during today’s game against UAB. Nevada will play Georgia Tech in the second game.

“Maybe people I know from Reno,” Padgett said, “but I think their fans are here to cheer for their team, not us.”

Nerves: Padgett says he expects to feel nervous today.

“I think we’re all anxious to get out there. Before a game like this, there’s a lot of buildup,” he said. “Once you get out there and start playing, the nervousness goes away.”

Langford on distractions in St. Louis: “The biggest distraction sometimes can be talking to the media, but seeing it’s the third time around, I kind of say the same stuff over and over. ‘They’re a good team. We respect them. We’re going to play hard.’ You say the same stuff, so really it doesn’t become as big an issue after a couple of times doing it.”
Self, on playing UAB instead of Kentucky: “I’m not surprised at all. I’m certainly not surprised Nevada is here. When we played Nevada (in 75-61 loss Dec. 21 in Reno), we had no idea at the time they were a Sweet 16 team, because at that time we thought we were that bad. They are as good as anybody, and UAB is as good as anybody. Right now, there’s not major upsets. There might be mild upsets, but not many major upsets.”