‘Not good enough’: Kansas basketball suffers first Big 12 loss in defeat at Texas Tech

LUBBOCK, Texas — Down nine points against Texas Tech at a timeout with 4:08 left in the second half, Kansas men’s basketball coach Bill Self had a decision to make on who he’d go with as his team attempted a late comeback.

The Jayhawks had trailed for most of the game to that point, without much production at all at the 5-spot from super-senior forward Mitch Lightfoot or senior forward David McCormack. Kansas had seen super-senior guard Remy Martin’s playing time limited in part due to foul trouble, and in part due to a knee injury that Self said kept Martin out of the starting lineup. And while the Jayhawks had enjoyed some success offensively, especially from redshirt sophomore forward Jalen Wilson and senior guard Ochai Agbaji, nobody's play had been without issue.

So Self turned to Wilson, who’d started in Martin’s place, to go in for McCormack alongside Agbaji, junior guard Christian Braun, super-senior guard Jalen Coleman-Lands and redshirt sophomore guard Dajuan Harris Jr. Self would say postgame Kansas was going to switch defensively 1-through-5, that they wanted their best offensive team and were going to be taking 3s, so there was no reason to play a big like McCormack or Lightfoot. And in some moments, it looked as if the plan might work.

But each time the Jayhawks brought their deficit to within a couple possessions, they’d see it grow again. At one point with less than a minute left they were only down four points, but in that final moment either because of a turnover or another reason they’d never score. Kansas suffered its first loss in Big 12 Conference play, a 75-67 defeat Saturday on the road against Texas Tech.

“I thought we were poor right from the jump,” said Self, whose team dropped to 12-2 overall and 1-1 in the Big 12. “I don’t think we played as competitive as they did for 40 minutes, even though we had some good possessions. ... Our only times we ever stopped them was when we went to a crappy zone and they went about six or seven possessions in a row without scoring.

"But after that, they kind of figured it out. So, I didn’t think we competed very hard. It’s a situation that, I’d like to go into a game and I think our players would like to know going into a game, kind of what we’re going to get going into a game.”

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The Red Raiders (11-3, 1-1 in Big 12) played without their two leaders in points per game, as the No. 25-ranked team in the latest coaches poll against the No. 6-ranked team, and still won. Texas Tech led for more than 33 minutes, and trailed at United Supermarkets Arena for only about a minute and a half. Mark Adams had spent the past five seasons as an assistant for the Red Raiders, and in his first chance as their head coach got the better of Self.

Wilson said the Jayhawks were out-worked, that Texas Tech’s guys played harder and brought the energy to the game. He thought the Red Raiders “punked” them “in a sense.” His season-high 20 points paired well with Agbaji’s team-high 24, and they each made their share of critical 3s, but defensively neither of them had much to say that was positive.

Self said if you had told him before the game Kansas would shoot how well it did from the field (44.7%), from beyond the arc (38.5%) and from the free-throw line (83.3%), even though it wasn’t pretty initially, he would have said that would be enough for a win.

But, obviously, it wasn’t.

Texas Tech didn’t need to shoot as well as Kansas on 3s or free throws because the Red Raiders were that much better from the field (28-for-55 compared to 21-for-47), and held the advantage in rebounding and ball security.

Self said Texas Tech’s ability to take charges was a point of emphasis the past two days. It didn’t translate enough to the court. Agbaji noted that because the Red Raiders had been drawing them so well Saturday, the Jayhawks became less aggressive when it came to driving inside.

“This was the first real road game we played even though St. John’s was on the road, even though Oklahoma State was on the road,” said Self, whose team was outscored 44-18 in points in the paint. “I don’t think the crowd had anything to do with our performance, but what (our team) didn’t understand was how turned up the other team will be when it’s the biggest game to date on their schedule so far this year and those sorts of things and they were coming off a disappointing loss and how coaches can use things as motivation. I don’t think we respected that. I think we thought we could show up and think we play hard and that would be good enough. It’s not good enough.”

With the nature of the quality of the Big 12, Self didn’t think the Jayhawks would go 18-0 during conference play. And no matter how much he’d like to say it, he isn’t going to say they’ll go 17-1 now with this as their lone defeat. Maybe Baylor will be good enough to do that, Self said, but he sees his team as one that’s going to have to battle to win away from Allen Fieldhouse.

At least in the way this loss happened, though, Wilson was surprised to see the mistakes he and his teammates made arise because of how many veterans there are on their roster. Agbaji was frustrated late to see Kansas get as close as it would before Texas Tech pulled away again and again.

“It shows us exactly what we need to do,” Wilson said about the loss. “We’ve got to approach every game playing harder than the opponent no matter who we’re playing, bring the energy to them even if we’re on the road and go off that.”

Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Kansas basketball vs. Texas Tech: Jayhawks suffer first Big 12 loss