K-State Q&A: Big 12 football schedules, Spygate and a pivotal stretch for Jerome Tang
This is an interesting time for Kansas State basketball coach Jerome Tang.
The shine of his unbelievable first season with the Wildcats, which ended with 26 victories and a trip to the Elite Eight, is beginning to fade now that his team is stuck in a losing streak and K-State is trending toward the wrong side of the NCAA Tournament bubble in Year 2.
I’ve had more than one K-State fan ask me recently if the honeymoon phase has ended for him.
Obviously, it has. No one would be asking that question if EMAW nation still cheered his every coaching decision without as much as a second thought.
The Wildcats have lost three games in a row for the first time under Tang. They also just lost their first home game by 20 points under Tang. Some are understandably going to be frustrated by those results.
In Tang’s defense, the recent losses came against No. 12 Iowa State, No. 4 Houston and No. 23 Oklahoma. It’s not like the Wildcats are losing to Fort Hays State. Sorry if you’re reading this, Bruce Weber. Too soon? They are still 14-7 overall and 4-4 in the Big 12 without getting a single minute from Nae’Qwan Tomlin or Ques Glover. Things might look much different with both of them in the lineup.
As is, this team has major question marks. Is Tylor Perry a shooting guard who is playing out of position at the point? Does this roster have enough scoring potential outside of Cam Carter, Arthur Kaluma and Perry to challenge for a return trip to March Madness? Why aren’t freshmen like Dai Dai Ames, R.J. Jones and Macaleab Rich helping more off the bench?
Also: has Tang been focused on the wrong things lately? Confronting Iowa State coach TJ Otzelberger with spying accusations (even if he was right about them) and then blasting a Big 12 official last week didn’t seem to help the Wildcats when they lost 73-53 to Oklahoma on Tuesday.
Fortunately, I don’t think we will have to wait long to get some definitive answers. Tang blamed himself for K-State’s latest defeat, and the Wildcats should almost certainly respond with spirited efforts in their next two games on the road at Oklahoma State and then back home against rival Kansas.
If the Wildcats win both games then all is right again in Manhattan. A split would leave many feeling the same way they do today. Two losses would not be well received.
A pivotal stretch of games is coming up for the Wildcats. It will be fascinating to see how Tang handles them after encountering his first true signs of adversity at K-State.
Now, let’s dive into your questions. Thanks, as always, for providing them.
Will the basketball team win another game this year? - @Kcksu1 via X
Man, if I’m getting this question then the honeymoon period is definitely over.
But the answer is most certainly yes. The Wildcats aren’t done winning.
Has there been even one single shred of evidence to support the allegations of huddle filming/sign stealing by Iowa State? If not, do you and/or anyone associated with the program/K-State athletic department plan on issuing an apology? - @_the_real_balla via X
I have absolutely no idea if Iowa State was guilty of spying on Kansas State last week at Hilton Coliseum.
That’s why I never said that the Cyclones got caught doing anything wrong against the Wildcats.
The purpose of my story was to explain why Tang lost his mind with 7 minutes, 51 seconds remaining in that game. Fans on both sides of the Farmaggedon rivalry wanted to know why he ended a media timeout by angrily pointing and shouting into the stands behind the K-State bench. They also wanted to know why he rushed to midcourt and confronted TJ Otzelberger about what he witnessed right then and there. Furthermore, fans wanted to know why the coaches got heated in the postgame handshake line and then refused to publicly talk about what was going on afterward.
Well, Tang did all that because he thought Iowa State was cheating.
Once you have some context on the situation and go re-watch that part of the game you can clearly see Tang complaining about it to Big 12 official Gerry Pollard by saying “they’re filming our huddles.”
I get why Iowa State fans aren’t happy that it became a big story that painted their team in a negative light. But that’s what happened.
Ignoring the situation and pretending that Tang was upset about someone eating nachos behind his team’s bench wasn’t an option.
I’m fine with Iowa State denying the allegations. In the absence of definitive proof, and I wrote in my initial story that these allegations would be very hard to prove, everyone is going to deny, deny, deny.
But there is a reason why no one at K-State has said a single word publicly about anything that happened. There will be no apology from the Cats. They saw what they saw.
In hindsight, I do think Tang and his coaching staff regret not quietly taking their concerns to the Big 12 office. There isn’t much of an advantage to gain by peeking into timeout huddles, and if a road team is truly worried about that there are easy ways to block outsiders from looking in.
So both sides can say pretty much anything they want about Farmageddon Spygate.
One thing is for sure: I very much look forward to the rematch at Bramlage Coliseum in March, even though Tang and Otzelberger say they are good now.
The K-State student section should have some highly entertaining antics prepared for that one.
What odds would you give the men’s basketball team for reaching the NCAA Tournament? - Andrew B. via e-mail
Something around 40% seems reasonable.
The Wildcats likely need to win five more games to feel confident about their chances of an at-large berth, and they will have to pull off an upset or two to make that happen. Ken Pomeroy and Bart Torvik project K-State as favorites in just two remaining games (at Oklahoma State and vs. West Virginia). Tang’s team will need to take care of business in each of those and then find at least three more wins elsewhere.
That could happen.
But it is hardly a guarantee. K-State has 10 games remaining and six(!) of them are against ranked teams.
ESPN bracket expert Joe Lunardi had the Wildcats listed outside of his projected field earlier this week. They have ground to make up. But any and all wins against K-State’s closing schedule will help in that area.
Who got the easiest Big 12 football schedule? - @wildkatphoto via X
Arizona got the easiest slate, in my book. The best teams in the conference next season should be Iowa State, Kansas, K-State, Oklahoma State and Utah. The Wildcats somehow dodged all but one of them in league play.
U of A will play at Utah, Texas Tech, at BYU, Colorado, West Virginia, at UCF, Houston, at TCU and Arizona State next season.
West Virginia had a strong season in 2023 despite not beating a single team with a pulse and Oklahoma’s only decent win was against Texas. I won’t be surprised if Arizona has the same kind of success in 2024.
BYU also got off easy in the sense that all of its toughest games are at home. Kansas State, Arizona, Oklahoma State and Kansas all have to go to Provo while the Cougars get road games against Baylor, UCF, Utah and Arizona State.
I’m surprised the Big 12 didn’t give them Utah at home, too.
West Virginia is a candidate for hardest schedule. Starting out with Kansas, at Oklahoma State, Iowa State and then K-State is not a recipe for success.
I have K-State somewhere in the middle. Fans will gripe about early road games in conference play, because it’s a tradition. But ending the season with an off week and then consecutive home games against Arizona State and Cincinnati will make up for that.
Can you please come up with a word other than “takeaways” to use in your headlines. Your use of the word so repetitively lazy and grating. - Connie K via e-mail
How dare you slander the amazing word “takeaway” as both lazy and grating.
You probably don’t think the term “embiggin” is very “cromulent” either. That’s a Simpsons joke. You’re welcome!
Takeaway is defined as “a key fact, point, or idea to be remembered.” So I don’t see what is wrong with using “takeaways” to describe my most notable observations from a K-State sporting event. In the past we have tried some of the following headlines:
Five things we learned from a game
Five thoughts on a game
Five observations about a game
Instant reaction to a game
K-State played Oklahoma in basketball on Tuesday, and you won’t believe what happened next
OK, so maybe that last one was made up. Point is, I liked “takeaways” best and I have stuck with it. I suppose I could try a new word at some point, but I am more inclined than ever to stick with takes (hip abbreviation) for the time being.
There is only one referee on a basketball court. The other two people with the black-and-white striped shirts and black pants are umpires. All of them are officiating the basketball game, as such any of them can correctly be referred to as officials. It pains me to read and hear the talking heads use “referees” and “refs” when referring to the officials. - Doug T via e-mail
Hey, I get it.
I think my fellow sports journalists should be fined when August rolls around and they refer to preseason football practices as “fall camp.” I also think we use the term “bye weeks” wrong on a football schedule. Can we not just say “open” or “idle.”
Maybe the term “Big 12 refs” should also fall into that category. Alas, those are the words most common fans use to describe the people who officiate basketball games in this conference. The word “ref” is also easier to say than “official” or “umpire.”
Personally, I would support simply calling them zebras.
