Columbia. Mo. ? Brandon Rush used to root for Missouri during Border Showdown – back then, it was called the Border War – battles against Kansas University.

“Yes I did, because my brother went there. (Now) I just want to whip on his team,” Rush, Kansas’s freshman guard from Kansas City, Mo., said.

Rush – brother of former Missouri standout Kareem Rush, who played his home games in Hearnes Center from 1999 to 2002 – tonight brings averages of 13.0 points and 5.3 rebounds to Mizzou Arena, site of a 6 p.m. battle between KU and MU. It will be shown live on ESPN, which is available locally on Sunflower Broadband Channel 33.

“I think they’ll treat me real bad,” Rush said of the MU fans. “Everybody is going to get booed. I think I’ll get it more. I handle stuff like that pretty well. I’m not sensitive at all. I just don’t care.”

Rush scored 17 points – all in the second half – of Wednesday’s 75-63 victory at Colorado, a game in which, “The fans were on me the whole game.”

Missouri coach Quin Snyder barks commands to his team in this file photo from Jan. 2 in Columbia, Mo. Snyder will coach the Tigers against archrival Kansas today in Mizzou Arena.

KU’s leading scorer, who made an unofficial visit to MU last summer after he decided to forego the NBA Draft, says he hopes the fans bring banners with his name on them.

“It’s on ESPN. It’ll give me more publicity with my name out there,” Rush quipped. “It’s going to be a little weird. I know the (MU) coaches so well. I play for Kansas now.”

Rush said brother Kareem won’t be on hand tonight because of responsibilities with the NBA’s Charlotte Bobcats.

“He’ll be pulling for me. I hope he’s pulling for me. He better be pulling for me, or we’ll box,” Rush said. “It’s a big rivalry game.”

Kareem may not be on hand, but there will be some loved ones in the stands rooting for Brandon in the hostile environment.

“Myself, his mom, probably four or five people,” Rush’s grandmother, Jeannette Jacobs, said “I want KU to win of course because of Brandon, but I know Quin (Snyder, MU coach) well and would feel bad for him, too (if KU wins). I’m just going to sit back and enjoy the game.”

As far as her other grandson, Kareem, the ninth-leading scorer in MU history: “We’ve not talked about it,” Jacobs said, “but I’m sure he will root for Brandon. It’s his brother. I’d think I’d root for my brother more than a school.”

Both KU (10-5, 1-1 Big 12 Conference) and MU (9-5, 2-1) enter coming off disappointing losses Saturday. The Jayhawks fell to Kansas State, 59-55, at Allen Fieldhouse, while the Tigers dropped a 74-71 decision to Colorado at Mizzou Arena. The Tigers fell on a last-second shot.

“As painful as this loss is and as much as you think, ‘Hey, this is a game that we felt we had won,’ we can’t be living in yesterday,” Snyder told the Associated Press. “We’ve got to go forward.

“It (the MU loss) probably affects the surroundings more, but I don’t think this game needs any more hype for our team. It’s Kansas, that’s enough.”

Thomas Gardner exploded for 22 points just two days after suffering a concussion in practice.

“It would be kind of hard if we didn’t play until next Saturday,” Gardner said. “We’ve got to put this game behind us. The team will be up for it just because it’s Kansas, and that’s a positive. We have a quick turnaround, so we have to get ready to win.”

“It’s just another game, and our team has to have it as a victory,” said guard Jimmy McKinney, who also had 22 versus the Buffs. “I’m not going to hype it up, it doesn’t need to be hyped.”

Of the game, KU’s Bill Self said: “We’ll approach it like it’s Missouri. We don’t like them and they don’t like us much.

“Missouri has run a lot of things offensively. I wish we had more time to prepare, but we don’t.”