Kansas basketball notebook

Kansas University freshman Brandon Rush, the brother of former Missouri player Kareem Rush, on the crowd booing him all night.

“They said some things. It wasn’t that bad,” Rush said. “I really wanted to win because my brother went here.”

The Antlers, MU’s student cheering section, were on Rush when the Jayhawks took the court at 4:40 p.m.

“Rush can’t read,” chanted the Antlers, many of the males wearing dresses.

“You are wearing the wrong jersey,” was another chant as well as, “Your scoring average is higher than your I.Q.”

One fan had a banner reading, “The only good Rush played for Mizzou.”

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Max cheered: MU’s fans cheered KU broadcaster Max Falkenstien loudly, many of the fans standing, when the legendary broadcaster was recognized by the public-address announcer in the second half. Falkenstien is retiring after this season.

Falkenstien said he was “astonished” at the ovation, and, “it ended up being really nice.”

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Hall to open soon: The Booth Family Hall of Athletics may be open for viewing for Saturday’s KU-Nebraska game in Allen Fieldhouse.

Trophies, pictures and exhibits, including a timeline of the history of KU athletics, have been installed the past several days.

“It’s spectacular,” KU associate athletic director Jim Marchiony said. “We’d like to open it this weekend. They worked hard all weekend setting up the exhibits, putting in artifacts.”

A Saturday opening would be eight months to the day from ground-breaking ceremonies.

“You can’t do it all in 15 minutes,” Marchiony said of fans viewing everything as they pass through the one-floor Hall on the way into, or exiting, the fieldhouse.

He noted it’d probably take four to five trips to soak everything in.

“Also, there’s the flexibility to change, add, delete things,” Marchiony said.

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Stats, facts: Thomas Gardner’s 40 points was second-most by a Tiger in a game against KU. Anthony Peeler had 43 points in 1992. Kim Anderson (38), Arthur Johnson (37), Tom Johnson (33), Melvin Booker (32), Derrick Chievous (31) and Mark Atkins (30) also had big games in the Border Showdown series. : KU is 1-2 in the Big 12 Conference for the first time since the inception of the league in 1997. : Mario Chalmers had a career-best four steals to go with career-high 22 points and eight assists.

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Big troubles: KU’s big men had been a disappointment heading into Monday’s game. The five big men combined for 12 points in Saturday’s loss to Kansas State.

“We thought it would be the strength of our team all year long,” Self said. “We thought we could generate about 32 points a game out of our five big guys. The Colorado game we generated 38, thanks primarily to Christian (Moody), who had 18.

“Other than Sasha (Kaun)’s eight points the other night, we had no inside game. That’s very discouraging. We’re not a good enough perimeter-shooting team consistently. We’re streaky, not good enough consistently to play through the perimeter.

“We’ve got to get C.J. (Giles) playing to his size, getting us more than zero points, one rebound (against K-State).

“It’s the opposite of what we thought six weeks ago. We thought we could deliver through our big guys. It’s the opposite.”