The Kansas Jayhawks were outrebounded 31-22 in their 91-85 loss to West Virginia on Saturday. The issues were on full display toward the end of the game, giving up offensive rebounds and fouls that would have had the same result, ultimately costing themselves the game.

One of the most consequential sequences of the game ended with West Virginia grabbing an offensive rebound off of a missed free throw. The Mountaineers got to the free throw line because Kansas missed out on two rebounds and had to foul Quinn Slazinski, who then grabbed his own miss on the free throw and made two free throws to move the lead to four after being fouled.

“Got to execute… That’ll cost you a ball game down the stretch if you don’t block out,” McCullar said. “We talk about free throw block out all the time, we work on it all the time. Today we didn’t block out at the free throw line at the end of the game and it cost us.”

Head coach Bill Self called the rebound from Slazinski a great play and that Johnny Furphy had originally done his job to box him out, but the long rebound allowed Slazinski time to make his move around Furphy.

While Furphy was at the center of attention toward the end of the game for not coming up with the key rebound, he ultimately was Kansas’ leading rebounder with seven. Self knew that the Jayhawks were not cleaning up the glass the way they are capable of when Furphy was the leading rebounder at halftime by a large margin.

“Whenever Johnny is your leading rebounder with six in the first half and your second leading rebounder had one, I mean that tells you a lot right there," Self said.

Hunter Dickinson came into the contest averaging 11.7 rebounds per game, but managed only five rebounds. During Kansas’ loss to UCF, he had just four.

Working against Dickinson and the entire Kansas team’s rebounding numbers however, was West Virginia shooting the ball at a high percentage. The Mountaineers shot 29-for-56, leaving limited opportunities for rebounds. The 27 misses from the Mountaineers is the least amount of misses Kansas has forced, meaning there were less opportunities on the boards.

However, Self wanted his team to be better on defense before the shot than they were, to force more misses. Ultimately, that did not happen and it led to a crucial loss.

“They didn't miss many shots, but you know that tells you a lot right there we didn't come as turned up as we needed to be,” Self said.