Sprint Center Stunner

By Case Keefer

Saturday, December 13, 2008

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As the Massachusetts players rushed onto the floor at Sprint Center in celebration, Sherron Collins lay there face down and motionless.

Collins, a junior guard, didn’t want to get up. He had no desire to look at what was happening above him, where the Minutemen congratulated each other with chest bumps and the scoreboard read Massachusetts 61, Kansas 60.

Collins hurt. Less than 10 seconds earlier, he missed a left-handed layup in traffic underneath the basket that would have given Kansas the victory.

“I got up there and I thought it was in,” Collins said. “It just came out.”

Photo Gallery

Men's Basketball vs. Massachusetts

A photo gallery of the basketball game against The University of Massachusetts.

But it wasn’t the final moment. Sophomore guard Conner Teahan grabbed the rebound on the left block with three seconds remaining and three Minutemen surrounded him.

Teahan hesitated. He didn’t get a shot off and the ball was knocked away. As players from both teams scrambled for the ball, the buzzer sounded.

“I think I messed up,” Teahan - who energized Kansas off the bench with five points and five rebounds - said. “I probably should have gone up with it honestly. It may have put us in a different situation than where we are right now, which is disappointing.”

Disappointing not only because the 2-6 Minutemen upset the 7-2 Jayhawks, but because Kansas received so many chances to avoid defeat. As Kansas coach Bill Self would say, the final possession where Collins missed the layup was only one of a series of miscues for Kansas.

One mistake particularly irked Self. With six minutes remaining in the game and Kansas trailing only 53-52, referee John Higgins gave Self a technical foul after the coach waved off a call he didn’t agree with.

Higgins warned Self in the first half that if he didn’t calm down, a technical was on the way. Self said he had done more in the past and not gotten a technical, but still deserved this one.

“You lose a game by one and a coach gets a ‘T’ with six minutes left and they make both free throws,” Self said. “The coach should know better than that.”

A team, however, should know better than to get outscored 18-3 during a five minute stretch in the first half. That’s what happened to the Jayhawks.

Kansas failed to make a field goal for seven minutes near the end of the first half. Massachusetts led 34-20 - Kansas’ largest deficit of the season - with two and a half minutes left. Minutemen guard Ricky Harris, who finished with 18 points, spurred the run by perfecting Massachusetts’ dribble-drive offense for 14 first-half points.

Whereas Self dwelled on the technical, his players found the stretch in the first half more aggravating.

“There’s not one person we can just blame,” sophomore center Cole Aldrich said. “You can’t blame me, you can’t blame Sherron, you can’t blame Teahan for not trying to shoot that ball. We lost it as a team at the very beginning when we didn’t come out to play.”

Aldrich, however, might have looked like the only Jayhawk who came to play. He scored 12 points and had 13 rebounds and two blocks.

But he was only able to attempt three shots in the second half. The Kansas guards couldn’t pass the ball into the post. Part of it was because of Massachusetts forward Tony Gaffney, who finished with six blocks and 13 rebounds.

The Minutemen also dared the Jayhawks to shoot long jumpers by not guarding the perimeter players closely and sneaking down near the paint.

“It was tough to get the ball inside. They really sagged hard,” Aldrich said. “I’d be a little hesitant to throw the ball in too if I was a guard.”

Without the option of tossing it down to Aldrich, manufacturing a comeback was solely Collins’ duty. Collins, who had 19 points and four assists but was only 6-for-21 from the field, came close.

He scored the Jayhawks’ final five points and nearly came up with a steal with 25 seconds remaining. Higgins made another call Self disagreed with moments later when he whistled freshman guard Tyshawn Taylor for a reach.

The foul sent Massachusetts guard Chris Lowe to the free-throw line. He missed both to keep the score 61-60, which gave the Jayhawks one last chance with 13 seconds remaining. That’s when Collins barreled into the clogged lane, switched the ball to his left hand and put up a shot that hit off the rim.

“It had no chance to go in from my perspective,” Self said. “At least for me, I didn’t think we executed. I didn’t think it was good judgment on the last play.”

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