Streak stopper: OU's Lon Kruger has history of pulling off a rare win at Kansas' Allen Fieldhouse
BY GUERIN EMIG World Sports Writer
Saturday, January 26, 2013
1/26/13 at 7:17 AM
LAWRENCE, Kan. - Twenty-five years ago nearly to this day, the clock at Kansas showed "00:00," the score read "Kansas State 72 Kansas 61," and Lon Kruger's first inclination was not to make too big a deal of it.
The Wildcats wouldn't strut around the court showing Jayhawk fans the front of their jerseys. Their coach certainly wouldn't show them his middle finger, as legend has it a certain Oklahoma coach once did after winning there.
"No, I don't think we did that," Kruger chuckles today. "We just got to the locker room and acted like we expected it."
Still, no matter how hard the Wildcats tried, there was no denying it: Jan. 30, 1988, was a very big deal indeed. Kansas' four-year, 55-game homecourt winning streak was gone, leaving devastation behind.
"I feel like the world is over," KU starting guard Milt Newton told the Lawrence Journal-World.
This is what it's like for the Jayhawks to lose at Allen Fieldhouse. Current players will be equally sad if KU falls to Kruger's Oklahoma Sooners at 3 p.m. Saturday afternoon. Their homecourt run is 32 and counting, and that just hints at their Allen Fieldhouse invincibility.
Over their last 102 home games, the Jayhawks are 101-1. It sounds like a record a second-grader might dream up on the playground to impress his pals.
But it is very real.
"Some kind of volume," OU assistant Steve Henson, Kruger's starting point guard in 1988, says of "The Phog."
"Their fans know when a team is on the verge of collapse, and they change their pitch and involvement even more," says Mike Shepherd, an OU assistant who sat on K-State's bench that day in '88 as Kruger's head student manager. "They know the game so well that they understand their significance. It's a unique situation, it really is."
Thus Kruger's statement: "They haven't lost many in there."
Well, it happened 25 years ago.
Kruger never has been one to channel Rockne. So when he gathered his Wildcats in their cramped locker room beneath the Fieldhouse din, he got right to the point.
"You take on that mentality of 'It's just us' in pregame," Henson recalls. "It's just us, just the 15 or 18 guys getting ready to go out. Nobody else in the building is going to think we can get it done. The underdog mentality, the us-against-everyone-else mentality is a special feeling on the road."
Mentality wasn't the only thing working for K-State that day. The Wildcats played four seniors. One of them was All-American guard Mitch Richmond.
And honestly?
"KU has had a lot of talent over the years," Henson says, "but that wasn't one of their strongest teams, I don't think."
Not at the time. In another six weeks, Danny Manning would carry the Jayhawks to an improbable national championship. But Jan. 30, 1988, KU came in 11-6 and 1-2 in the Big 8 Conference. K-State was 3-0 in the league, with Richmond playing better than Manning and anyone else.
"Coach would always say how many Mitch would have to have for us to win," Shepherd says. "I think he had 33 at home when we beat Oklahoma. I guess that day, we needed 35 from him."
Richmond had 12 at the half as K-State trailed 31-29. He finished with 35.
"I remember Mitch being very big in that game," Kruger says. "I know we threw it to him a bunch down the stretch, and he kind of carried us home."
He scored 23 in the second half, including eight during an 11-1 run that catapulted the Wildcats ahead for good in the final eight minutes.
Manning finished with 21 points, but just six came after halftime.
"We didn't play any gimmick defense or anything," Kruger says, "other than anytime you have a player like that, our typical response is give extra help from other guys on the team."
"Back in those days, we played a lot of 3-2 zone," Henson recalls. "We had a lot of undersized interior guys that year, so we did a lot of that. When Manning caught it, we had to give him a lot of attention."
The Jayhawks might have liked to make K-State pay for that attention, but, as Shepherd points out: "KU was struggling to make shots at that time."
KU went 4-of-16 on 3-pointers. The Wildcats went 9-of-12. Henson made both of his 3s and outplayed Edison graduate Kevin Pritchard, his friend from high school all-star camps, at the point. Will Scott made four.
It all blended perfectly. Experience. Composure (K-State went 10-of-10 from the line down the stretch). Shot-making. Toughness (K-State won the rebounding battle 36-22). A star playing to his capability.
Take these ingredients into Allen Fieldhouse, you have a prayer. It is answered every three or four years, every 55 or 60 games, and it leaves the Jayhawks in disbelief.
"I didn't think we'd ever lose here," forward Chris Piper told the Journal-World.
Twenty-five years ago, and despite how Kruger remembers it today, the mood at the other end of the Fieldhouse was quite different.
"I remember the excitement in our locker room once we got back there after the game," Shepherd says, "with Mark Dobbins and Mitch and Charlie (Bledsoe) and Will and Steve. It was an awfully, awfully hard place to win basketball games.
"It still is."
Big 12 basketball: Oklahoma at Kansas
3 p.m. Saturday Allen Fieldhouse, Lawrence, Kan.
TV: ESPN-25 Radio: KTBZ am1430
*assists per game
Oklahoma (13-4, 4-1 Big 12)
|
|
Ht. |
Pt. |
Rb. |
| F |
M'Baye |
6-9 |
10.2 |
5.6 |
| F |
Osby |
6-8 |
14.5 |
6.5 |
| G |
Hield |
6-3 |
9.4 |
4.8 |
| G |
Pledger |
6-4 |
11.0 |
3.3 |
| G |
Hornbeak |
6-3 |
5.7 |
2.5 |
Kansas (17-1, 5-0)
|
|
Ht. |
Pt. |
Rb. |
| F |
Young |
6-8 |
7.4 |
6.8 |
| C |
Withey |
7-0 |
13.0 |
8.3 |
| G |
Johnson |
6-4 |
9.6 |
4.9* |
| G |
McLemore |
6-5 |
16.1 |
5.4 |
| G |
Releford |
6-6 |
12.9 |
3.3 |
Kansas' historic homecourt advantage
How tough is Oklahoma's task at Kansas today? The Jayhawks have won 101 of their last 102 games at Allen Fieldhouse, including 32 in a row. Of course, that's only KU's fourth-longest homecourt streak since 1984. A look at the top three:
69 straight
Span: Feb. 2007 - Jan. 2011
How it ended: Eleventh-ranked Texas used a 51-28 second-half surge to knock off No. 2 Kansas 74-63. The night before, KU forward Thomas Robinson learned of the death of his mother.
62 straight
Span: Feb. 1994 - Dec. 1998
How it ended: Iowa made 8-of-11 3-pointers in a second-half rally from 18 points behind, and the Hawkeyes prevailed 85-81. Kent McCausland hit three of those 3s in the final four minutes.
55 straight
Span: Feb. 1984 - Jan. 1988
How it ended: Mitch Richmond scored 23 of his 35 points in the second half to lead Kansas State to a 72-61 victory. The Jayhawks would lose two more home games, before going on their improbable run to the national championship.
Original Print Headline: Streak stopper
Guerin Emig 918-581-8355
guerin.emig@tulsaworld.com
Associated Images:
Kansas State players celebrate their win over Kansas on Jan. 30, 1988, snapping the Jayhawks' 55-game home win streak. Lawrence Journal World Collection, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas/Courtesy
Then-Wildcats head coach Lon Kruger directs his team. Lawrence Journal World Collection, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas/Courtesy
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