Published Jan 28, 2023
Post-game reaction: Bill Self after the Kentucky win
Shay Wildeboor  •  JayhawkSlant
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The Jayhawks snapped a three-game losing streak with a win over Kentucky.

Bill Self talked about the road win and gave his thoughts on the final game in the Big 12-SEC challenge.

See what Self had to say after the game.

You really hurt them really in two places, defending the pick and roll and then on the glass…

Self: Well, I'll be candid, we hoped to attack them in the pick and roll, but we were just preying on the rebounding stuff. So yeah, we did a great job defensive rebounding. We hadn't rebounded the ball like that in a while. He's so good and big and active that if you double or if you force help, it creates rotation rebounding.

And I think we were probably fortunate tonight, the ball bounced our way a little bit. But we did do a great job on the glass. I don't know how many points we scored off ball screens, but it had to be close to 20 tonight. So that was really good for us.

How gritty was the performance that Kevin McCullar gave you…

I asked Kevin if he wanted to go back. He said, "Heck yeah. I'm already hurt. Might as well play." Yeah, he was great. He rebounded the ball, he got his hands on several balls. We're trapping, and our rotations aren't great, but he made up for others' mistakes because he's so smart defensively. And he hadn't shot the ball great of late. And then he makes the biggest shot of the game probably to give us a little cushion there late. So I'm really happy with him.

I thought all our guys did great. I thought all our starting five did great. I thought Jalen played like a first team All-American down the stretch. I thought Dajuan controlled the game. I thought Gradey did some good things even though they really keyed on him. And KJ had one of his best games. So, if you could have all five starters play well the same night, you got a chance. And that's what happened with us.


You were able to snap a losing skid on the road at Kentucky…

Self: Well, I think, I can't speak for Kentucky, and I don't want to, but there's some similarities in pride that existed both places. The win they got at Tennessee was very similar to the win we got tonight. They didn't have a lot of momentum at that moment, and we didn't either. And they probably put together as good of performance as we've seen on the road. And I don't know that ours was that good tonight, but considering where we were, and you look out there, we're not the biggest team. We don't have a lot of depth. There's some things that we don't do great, but our guys do compete and they fight and I think there's just a lot of pride within it,

How important were Jaun’s two threes early…

Self: Well, I told him he had to shoot and make at least three tonight and he didn't. But the first two were huge and we had run of terrible offense the first five minutes and we didn't guard them at all the first five minutes and they were just playing with us. And so sometimes making a shot covers up some poor play. And that's what happened early. And then we settled in after that. So those were big shots.

You had a whole week to think about this one and put the others behind you and you had to like what you saw in that way…

Self: Yeah, but you guys make a bigger deal out of stuff than what I think coaches do. Yeah, we had to put it behind us because there was a next game. We would approach it the same way if we'd have won on Monday. But our league is a monster and I mean, it's a monster. And our next three games are top 10, top 10, top 10, so it's not going to get any easier. We can't get hung up on a span of bad play because it's a snippet in the big picture. And our guys actually did a pretty good job acting pretty mature about it.

Zuby was in a boot what is his status…

Self: Well, he turned his ankle. He couldn't return today so he got it pretty good. But I don't know if what his availability will be moving forward at all. I have no idea.

You were down to nine scholarship guys, when Kevin went out, was there any level of concern or were you confident…

Self: Well, I was more confident when he came back, but yeah, I mean think our guys are capable of doing well. But the way that we were trying to trap the posts and stuff, if we didn't have Kevin, it would've been dead. Oscar would've had a much bigger night if Kevin hadn't come back.


With Ernest what did you like about what he brought during his time on the floor…

Self: Well, we thought if we could sit actually screen somebody, we could get out of it and run to the rim. And we were able to get six basically points that way, pretty easy baskets. And I thought he did a good job there. And he's young and he's not ready to defend him one-on-one, but I actually thought he did a pretty good job of staying between him and the basket.


With KJ, how'd you feel he played on the defensive end against Oscar and offensively…

Self: Yeah, I thought that was something we wanted to do is KJ score, to try to drive it. And he did a good job on that, and I thought he played great. He's just not very big guy. He's 6-foot-6. But he was active. But when we didn't trap, he got buried there some the second half, but he was exhausted too. That's a big guy to try to push when you actually never moving. And so he was worn out tonight.


Calipari likes to say that when Kentucky goes on the road, it's everybody's Super Bowl. And I assume it's similar for you guys in your league when you go. How much does that help you when you come into this environment and you're just not phased by all the noise…

Self: Well, I actually believe that our guys will perform better in environments like this. And I'm sure Kentucky players feel the same way. I'm sure they feel like when they go to some place, they'd rather be full than not full because they're used to playing full. And that's how we are too. When you have the name Kansas or Kentucky across your chest, I don't want to say that you're everyone's biggest game, but it's certainly a game everyone circles every year.


How did you keep answering the runs from Kentucky in the second half…

Self: We had some guys, they cut it to one once, if I'm not mistaken and J-Wil just came down and made a long three. If the lead ever switches, momentum definitely would feel different. But we did a good job of having good, short runs against them and not letting them go on a 10-2 run or anything like that. That was, you keep them out of transition and keep him off the glass, you got a chance to do that. And we were able to do that.