Does the weird and bad loss to Dayton actually mean anything?
Let's discuss
Honestly, what a crazy buzzer beater. It’s hard to deny it! That shot was Mustapha Amzil’s first shot attempt of the game, and honestly, you couldn’t ask for a more dramatic, Plinko-style fall through the night right as the horn sounded. Stunning stuff.
Let’s be clear: Kansas did not deserve to win, as they blew multiple opportunities to finish off Dayton, a team that has lost to Lipscomb and UMass-Lowell this season. The last play—a completely botched post-up for David McCormack—was a howler live, before clarification later came that Remy Martin messed up the set. Sometimes Self’s KU loses itself in the game of hunting matchups and they forget to play basketball. It happens.
But the fact that Remy went to the wrong spot isn’t the thing that stuck out to me from the play’s full breakdown. From Jesse Newell’s detailed piece:
Start with this about Self: He wants control. And further, one of his great strengths over time has been to gather talented players before getting them to play unselfishly for the good of the team. One of Self’s favorite mantras he uses with his team: “When you win, the pie is big enough for everyone.”
In other words, if you buy into your team role and win, everyone benefits from that success. So let’s be blunt here: Self has not yet gotten through to Martin.
For most of the final five minutes when KU was trailing, Martin resorted to playing heroball. But, in all honesty, it was part of what kept KU from taking the lead sooner, as Martin missed on a couple of critical possessions while firing up before giving offense a chance to work.
All of us have certainly given the benefit of the doubt to Bill Self—or I have, at least. These headgames have mostly paid off in the past, as he clashed with other headstrong players who needed to rein in it. He clearly wasn’t going to let Martin have the ball, and I can’t help but imagine Self set Martin up to fail on the final play. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. But it’s easy to believe either way.
Going to digress for a second: I thought the final play was awful, even if it had worked. It’s a time-expensive gambit, feeding into a post player who had struggled all game. Calling on Dave there makes no sense. Why not run something for Agbaji there? I know that Self does not trust a field goal attempt that happens further than two feet away from the rim, but Agbaji was hot in the moment, and I’m having a hard time believing there isn’t an easy way to get him open for a catch-and-shoot midrange jumper. I feel like that’s much more high percentage than a Dave back-down, especially in that game. Isn’t it hilarious that Self’s most famed playcall of all time generated a three pointer?
Circling back, I want to ask a bigger question about Self’s psychological war with Remy Martin: Do we have time for this?
Bill Self recruited Remy Martin, and has four years of tape on him. I’m not buying that he’s completely surprised by what kind of player he is. At times, Martin has played in control, made the right play, and he’s saved busted possessions a handful of times. This is a veteran roster, including a player who is 24 and one who is 25. I just don’t see how a 10-to-15-game teaching moment is constructive when the goal here is something way larger. It’s hard to watch Duke and Gonzaga’s talent go bucket for bucket, largely being trusted by their coaches to play free and decisively when they’re going against talent, and then feel like Self’s stubbornness is preventing this team from growing into their ceiling.
Remy messed up. You can’t argue against that. But I’m starting to worry just a little about the Jayhawks. A few friends have voiced an opinion, which has fully incepted me: can KU continue to play this way and hang with college’s elite teams, who fly down the floor, play fast and attack early in the shot clock? The USC tournament game is still fresh in the memory, and Evan Mobley is the real deal. But will KU get left in the dust, running overcomplicated plays that are becoming dinosaurs in the modern game? It’s something to watch.
Pour a Pitino-sized glass of Casamigos for a short and stylistically choppy discussion of the Iona game
Better! When KU can get out in the open floor, they’re so dangerous. McCormack rode the bench for most of this one, but when he came in, he played more deliberately and effectively, to the tune of 13 points in 14 minutes. Jalen Wilson might have wasted an opportunity to get going—outside of a few nice finishes playing from the baseline, he’s been tentative and his shot isn’t falling. Agbaji had a nice, well-rounded game, featuring a truly blistering finish on a lob.
Christian Braun is…. our glue guy now? Many things are happening that no one could have predicted.
I never bet on KU basketball, because I don’t trust them at all with the spread, but there was a truly hilarious backdoor cover in this game. You love to see it.
Giving Tuesday
My plan was to drop this newsletter on Giving Tuesday, but it didn’t quite work out. Luckily, a lot of these fundraising campaigns last throughout the holiday season. It’s a really good opportunity to donate to places where there’s a matching program—also, a lot of these spots have little applications that let you figure out if your employer has a matching program as well. Here’s a few places I’m donating to!
Wayside Waifs animal shelter (matching up to $15k)
First Nations Development Institute (matching up to $125k)
I’ll also be donating some subscription funds to my Brooklyn Public Library—libraries are amazing, and I’m sure your local library is doing a drive right now—and a local animal shelter called Sean Casey Animal Rescue. If you know of cool spots to donate right now, please leave links in the comments! Thank you!
Speaking of giving, gift subscriptions to the newsletter are available for the Jayhawk fans in your life!
RIP Virgil
I was devastated to learn of the passing of Virgil Abloh, and while this is slightly outside of the purview of this newsletter, I wanted to take a beat to celebrate just how much of an individual Virgil was. It’s deeply sad we won’t get to see his fingerprint on pop culture going forth. His work could be divisive—sometimes even bluntly and intentionally so—but there’s nothing cooler to me than this guy starting out with a screenprinter and ending up as the creative director of Louis Vuitton.
Something in an Abloh interview—conversations he gave freely, generously, and excitedly—I think about is when Virgil talks about the inspiration behind his creative work with the biggest brands in the world:
To me it's a renaissance of black creatives that have figured out that it's not just rap, it's not just name-checking brands. Because now we’re at the brands that we’re name checking. We’re making runway collections and albums that couldn't have been made before.
Virgil built a structure over everything—it all flowed into the same bucket for him, and that showed in his work, which was basically everywhere. He was a master of collaboration, and a giving designer. He shared his resources; much of his site is product designs and behind-the-scenes detail that’s designed to enrich anyone who is curious, rather than hiding it behind an opaque wall of creativity. And that’s what I’ll remember about Virgil: he was more curious, more studied, and weirder than the public perception. He wanted to learn, keep growing, and he lived his life on fast forward. RIP Virgil. We will really miss you.