Michigan State forward Nick Ward (44) gets a bucket against Miami during the second half on Friday, March 17, 2017 at BOK Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Tulsa, Okla. — Earlier this season, the Kansas basketball team had trouble with its interior defense against talented big men.

There were the standout games from Reid Travis, Jarrett Allen, Vlad Brodizansky, and a couple of other opponents in the first half of the year.

Heading into the second round of the NCAA Tournament against Michigan State on Sunday (4:15 p.m., CBS), the Jayhawks will attempt to slow down freshmen forwards Miles Bridges and Nick Ward.

Bridges, 6-foot-7, 230 pounds, is a potential lottery pick in the upcoming NBA Draft, averaging a team-best 16.7 points and 8.3 rebounds per game. He’s scored at least 15 points in seven straight games.

“He’s an unbelievable athlete, but he’s got unbelievable feel,” Kansas coach Bill Self said of Bridges. “I mean just making the extra pass or just knowing when to cut. And they play through him a lot. They play through him probably about as much as they play through well, I guess Denzel (Valentine) last year, but they put the ball in his hands a lot to make decisions.”

Kansas freshman Josh Jackson will likely draw the primary defensive assignment against Bridges, a good friend of his, which would match senior center Landen Lucas versus the 6-8, 250-pound Ward (13.9 points, 6.6 rebounds per game).

Of course, KU’s team defense will rely on more than one-on-one match-ups in the post. Guards are expected to do their part to help through help defense and ball pressure.

“I think the toughest part is you can tell guys what to do, but when you play against good guys that are hard to handle, the execution isn’t always what you tell (them),” Self said. “It’s hard to simulate athletic ability.”

Adding a wrinkle to the difficulty of preparing for Bridges and Ward is the one-day turnaround in the second game of the tournament’s weekend.

It goes both ways for all teams, but it doesn’t make it any easier to stop two of the top freshmen in the Big Ten.

“They run so many plays and got so many sets that one day of preparation, you really can’t get a good feel for all the stuff they run or try to memorize a lot of their plays,” KU junior guard Devonte’ Graham said. “But we just had practice and we just went over the scouting report kind of in depth and we’ll go back to the hotel and do the same thing. So it’s just trying to get a good feel for a lot of the sets that they run.”