K-State vs Wisconsin Recap

The NCAA Tournament is a fickle beast. There’s joy in getting in and beginning the road to the final four but only 1 of the 68 teams that enter it will actually finish with a victory. That means 67 teams and sets of fans are left to deal with the agony of ending months of anticipation and games with losses. Some of those 67 losses will be by a wide margin where it’s easy to see that the opponent was more talented, but the majority will come just like Kansas State’s. It’s the type of game that will be replayed over and over in minds thinking about that one turnover, that ball bouncing the wrong way, or that final shot that just didn’t drop. It eats away at a person for days. Kansas State, more specifically Jacob Pullen, played its heart out but came up just short in an opportunity to return to the sweet 16 for the second season in a row. There’s plenty more time in the coming weeks to reflect on the season as a whole but for now continue reading to get the good, bad, and ugly of the final game of the 2010-2011 season and see how one player created a new category all for himself.

Epic

Jacob Pullen…What other word could describe what this guy did? He threw a team on his shoulders and almost single handedly sent them to the sweet 16. He tied a career high in points (38) on the biggest stage when it meant the most on the way to becoming the all time leading scorer in KSU history. Pullen came to play no matter who was or wasn’t there with him and if nothing else, made it so the nation will never forget him. He made Jordan Taylor look like a bad AAU player (reminiscent of Jimmer last year) and answered the battle of point guards in the first 5 minutes. Without a doubt, one of the best ever to play for Kansas State and the perfect place to begin a new category that will be used few and far between.

Good

Defense… Kansas State played great defense all night long. Wisconsin had every shot and pass challenged and were hounded the entire game. Spradling was the unexpected bright spot in his extra assignment when Pullen had to sit but every player stepped it up in different ways. Some might disagree seeing the final score was 70-65 but this was a game that came down to a last second shot because of the defensive toughness.

Bad

Offense… Pullen excluded, what in the world happened?! Kelly chipped in 11 points but basically disappeared after scoring 7 of those in the first 10 minutes of the game. McGruder who is normally good for 10+ finished with 3 and air balled a couple open shots. Everyone else followed suit and decided to take the night off from scoring.

Free throws… What had been a strength in the final games of the season came back to bite hard against Wisconsin. Kansas State went 15-22 from the line which equates to an ugly 68.2%. Some of those came in pretty crucial spots as well.

Ugly

Refs… Referees never win or lose a game but they sure have a huge impact on how things happen. That was extremely evident in this game. Kansas State seemed to be unable to put a finger on Wisconsin’s players. On the other hand, Wisconsin routinely hammered K-State guys and never got called for it. I had to watch this game with no sound and it was amazing how different it made things. Half the time I was wondering why the action stopped only to see that there was a foul being called on K-State. The other half of the time I was wondering why the play continued on after an obvious foul had taken place. I’ll point to the missed free throws long before I’d point to the Zebras but those three were the only ones who could slow down Pullen and they made sure to do it.

Reporters… How is it that Kansas State has been assigned the worst reporters possible by every major newspaper in the area? No wonder those things are circling the drain. I didn’t really like Kellis Robinett before Saturday night and you can be sure that I, like most K-State fans, have no use for him now. It’s not all because of his question to Pullen either. While that was as cheap as it gets and a generally crappy thing to do, Robinett has a long history of being a tool when it comes to covering K-State. The post game conference was the final piece of evidence needed to finally hope that the KU loving creep gets reassigned to covering the feed yards of Dodge City. And if that isn’t enough, Kent Babb spent his entire Saturday night defending Robinett while taking shots at Head Coach Frank Martin, Chiefs HC Todd Haley, and any K-State fan who thought differently than himself. Check out his twitter feed history if you need more reason to get hacked off. I want both of these guys removed from covering K-State more than I want a new defensive coordinator.