Frank Lorenzo
(8) Kansas Jayhawks (-5.5, 128 o/u) at Kansas State Wildcats
A Big 12 rivalry game will hit center stage tonight when the No. 8 Kansas Jayhawks (22-5, 11-3 Big 12) take on the Kansas State Wildcats (13-15, 6-9 Big 12) at Bramlage Coliseum (9:00 p.m. Eastern).
The Wildcats have lost seven of their last eight games and arguably saved their worst performance for their most recent, dropping an 69-42 game to Baylor on Saturday. The team was ice cold from beyond the arc, going 1/16 in the game.
“You’ve got to make some 3s,” Kansas State coach Bruce Weber said. “When we’ve played against them, we’ve made 3s.”
The loss dropped K-State to 6-9 inside the Big 12, and they are now third-last in the conference.
The Jayhawks, meanwhile, have won three of their last four, including an 81-72 win over TCU on Saturday. Perry Ellis scored 23 points over the Horned Frogs, helping his team rebound from a crushing last-second loss to West Virginia, in which Ellis missed the winning lay-up at the buzzer.
“I was anxious to play, get back on the court,” said Ellis after the win over TCU. “It was tough, man. I knew I had a chance to make [the last-second shot against West Virginia], but I couldn’t.”
The Jayhawks are 5.5-point road favorites tonight, while the O/U is at 128.
These teams have very similar ATS numbers on the season. Kansas is 15-11 against the spread, while the Wildcats are 14-11. But K-State has been dismal ATS when facing the Jayhawks in recent memory, going just 4-13 in their last 17 home games against Kansas.
(Photo credit: SD Dirk (flickr) [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode]. Photo has been cropped.)
