Some thoughts…from Allen Fieldhouse

Gary Bedore, Journal-World KU men’s basketball beat writer

“Brandon Rush had a fabulous game proving he’s completely recovered from ACL surgery. His halfcourt shot almost went in, but maybe the Jayhawks are better off it didn’t go in. They had to earn the win in overtime. Nice game by Chase Budinger of ‘Zona. Good game for the Jayhawks to gut out a victory.”

Tom Keegan, Journal-World sports editor

“Chalk up another one for modern medicine. Brandon Rush, less than six months removed from ACL surgery, ran, jumped and shot his team to an overtime victory that was such a thrilling game that the NBA scouts stayed seated throughout, instead of leaving early as so many of them usually do.”

Ryan Greene, KUSports.com editor

“What a way to ring in the unofficial start to basketball season, huh?

I’ve long thought that the key to this team moreso than anyone else is Russell Robinson, who of the five seniors has been the true glue guy in running the show with little fanfare. Tonight, for whatever reason, Robinson was off. Hence, the game was a bit closer, since he couldn’t be on the floor more than usual (only 25 minutes). I’d expect him to have a big game Wednesday.

As for Brandon Rush, I thought the most surprising thing he did was elevate high enough to throw down a Mario Chalmers lob with two hands in the second half, proving to many that he’s come full-circle following his knee surgery. I still think he starts Sunday at USC.”

Inside the numbers

36: Brandon Rush was only supposed to play 20 minutes tonight. Or at least that was the plan. A late first half injury to Tyrel Reed (who tweaked his ankle under Darnell Jackson) pushed him to play some more, and any questions about Rush’s ability to bounce back from ACL surgery were completely pushed out the window. It was no picnic guarding Chase Budinger most of the night, but Rush it appears would be at 100 percent by conference season.

25: Arizona had several chances to pull away in the second half when KU went through some rough offensive and defensive stretches, but the young ‘Cats simply shot themselves in the feet too much. UA committed 25 turnovers, including seven by stud freshman point guard Jerryd Bayless, who added a black eye to a stat line that included 19 points.

2: The Jayhawks, who have relied so much on the three-point shot to create scoreboard separation here early on in the non-con season, hit just two longballs all night, with both coming off the fingers of Brandon Rush. It could just be a bump-in-the-road thing, but in the long term, it was probably good for KU to have to grind it out, instead, scoring 46 points in the paint to Arizona’s 18.

27: Despite fouling out late and his team suffering its second loss of the season, it’s hard to refute Chase Budinger’s incredible performance in the Fieldhouse Sunday. Like Reggie Miller did for so many years with the Indiana Pacers, he moved well without the ball around several screens and canned numerous three-pointers. He finished with 27 points on 10-of-23 shooting.

29: KU pulled down only 29 rebounds, and was outworked on the glass by Arizona by nine. Bill Self again had to call out his big men for their glasswork. A mid-major opponent Wednesday in Florida Atlantic could serve as a good bounceback opportunity for the bigs to make a statement before playing at Southern Cal next Sunday.

13: Rodrick Stewart scored 13 points, including a huge three-point play to start the overtime period. He also had a rim-rocking jam in Jerryd Bayless’ face on a fast break off of a Sasha Kaun swat in the second half. He’s proven he’s a solid offensive option and can provide energy, but Bill Self says now he must provide lockdown defense to be a completely well-rounded contributor.

Just in case you missed it…

Mario Chalmers wasn’t swishing at a regular clip like always from deep, but he had to leave a pretty good impression with the 12 NBA scouts on-hand Sunday night. Chalmers had several key buckets, finishing with 14 points and seven assists to just two turnovers. He also recorded three steals, and threw a beautiful lob to Rush in overtime for what proved to be the Wildcats’ backbreaker.

Hopefully you didn’t miss it…

KU’s experience and veteran presence was huge in a game like this. While guys like Chase Budinger and Jerryd Bayless made some mistakes late and tended to pout at times, KU fought off adversity with visible ease and never lost its cool during tense late moments. While Budinger fouled out and Bayless had to be calmed by interim coach Kevin O’Neill several times, Rush, Arthur, Chalmers and co. made overtime look effortless at certain times.

They said it…

Bill Self on Rush’s final shot in regulation: “I’m glad it didn’t go in, because we need to play five more competitive minutes like that and have some good things happen. I mean I would have been really glad if it went in, but since we won the game, we needed five more minutes to execute with the pressure on.”

Bill Self on what he learned about his team from this one: “I know that we don’t play smart. We had a chance to crack the game open and had about six straight terrible offensive and defensive possessions consecutively. So we played stubborn, which is very frustrating. Instead of playing to our strengths, we play stubborn. And I know we don’t rebound – our big guys don’t rebound. And also we’ve got to figure out who our lockdown defender is. Brandon’s not ready to be that yet….From a positive standpoint, once the game was 40-40 at halftime, they weren’t going away. It was going to be a close game no matter what. I thought that it was good we played in a tight game, thought it was good we had to execute form behind and make free throws with the pressure on. There were a lot of good things that happened. I do think we have tough kids, and I do think we’re poised. But we play stubborn. And what I mean by that is we know what we should do, but there’s that inside of us saying ‘Yeah, but I can do this.’ And it doesn’t play out to work, and it certainly didn’t work tonight.”

Bill Self on his plan for using Rush going into the game: “We were going to play Brandon 20 minutes. Medical staff said he was feeling good, looking good, wasn’t fatigued, so play him more. But if Tyrel hadn’t gotten hurt, if Russell hadn’t committed those two silly fouls to end the half to give him three, and then Rod gets called for the touch foul to end the half to give him three, if those things hadn’t happened, he would have played 20. And the outcome would have been different. So we were fortunate.”

Bill Self on getting the ball into the big men more: “We have to see it. And then if we see it, it’s a confidence standpoint to get the ball to them. But to me it looked like our post guys were wide open, our guards didn’t deliver the ball at all. We’ve got to play through Darrell. The sooner we learn that, the better off we’ll be. We still haven’t quite figured that out yet. So hopefully we’ll get better at that.”

Bill Self on Rodrick Stewart’s performance: “He was good. Rod was good. He’s got to become a lockdown defender, but he was good. He played very well, played smart, took care of the ball, I thought it was probably his best collegiate game.

Bill Self on Russell Robinson: “I don’t know what it was, but it was not good. He’s been so consistent for us, and hopefully tonight was just one of those nights where things just didn’t go well.”

Brandon Rush on KU benefitting from a game like this: “It was an overtime win, it was a grind-it-out game, and we needed one of those, with the last couple of games being blowouts. It’s not good that I missed that shot, I wish it would have went in there and the game would have ended five minutes earlier.”

Brandon Rush on how his knee felt afterwards: “I’ve been looking forward to playing an entire game. I feel fine, no soreness, no nothing.”

Brandon Rush on joking with UA’s Jawan McClellan following his halfcourt miss: “I was laughing at Jawan. He was talking about the shot. I guess before the end of the game, he’d said ‘don’t make a miracle’ or something like that. I said ‘One almost came true.'”

Brandon Rush on guarding Chase Budinger: “That could have worn anybody out. I was probably guarding him 25 minutes of the game. Those screens started killing me, running around, getting hit, getting hit, left and right, they were moving on the screens a little bit, but I ain’t complaining about it.”

Darrell Arthur on the lift KU got from Rush’s 36 minutes played: “It just makes the whole team play better seeing him out there playing, doing good. It just makes the whole team come out and play. When we see him play hard, we’re going to play hard.”

Mario Chalmers on Rush’s 36 minutes played: “Going into the game, I didn’t think he’d play 36 minutes. But in the back of my mind, I knew he’d play a lot of minutes tonight because we’re short with Sherron out and when Tyrel got hurt, so we knew he had to play a little bit more.”

Mario Chalmers on his lob to Rush in OT: “It didn’t surprise me. That’s our bread-and-butter. Every time one of us drives, we look for Brandon to go back door. And he’s always there. That’s a play we work on in practice and stuff, so we knew he could do it.”

Notable…

…KU is 5-0 for the first time since 2004-05, when KU opened up 14-0…KU leads the all-time series with Arizona now 7-3…KU has now won four straight overtime games, including three in 2006-07…Brandon Rush’s second of two free throws in overtime made him the 49th member of KU’s 1,000-point club…Darrell Arthur’s 20 points were a season high, and it was his first 20-point game since scoring 26 early last season against Towson on Nov. 19…Rodrick Stewart’s 13 points were a season high and were his most ever as a Jayhawk. He scored 14 twice while at Southern Cal….KU has now forced at least 18 turnovers in all five games this season, and at least 20 on four occasions…KU’s 15 turnovers were a season-high…KU has held 76 of its last 79 opponents under 50 percent shooting from the field…Arizona’s five steals were the fewest by a KU opponent this season…