Bruce Weber Previews the Oklahoma State Game
Jan 08, 2021 | Men's Basketball
MANHATTAN, Kan. – K-State head coach Bruce Weber met with members of the media via Zoom on Friday afternoon, as the Wildcats continue preparations for Saturday's home game with Oklahoma State at 5 p.m., CT. The game will air nationally on ESPN2.
K-State and Oklahoma State will meet for the 138th time in their histories with the Wildcats holding an 82-55 advantage in a series that dates back to 1922. The Wildcats are 40-17 all-time at home, including a 13-11 mark at Bramlage Coliseum. The Cowboys have split the last 4 meetings in Manhattan, including a 64-59 win in the last matchup on Feb. 11, 2020.
Oklahoma State is 7-3 on the season after dropping an 87-84 loss to No. 14/16 West Virginia on Monday.
"They start with their two main guys. Isaac Likekele, I don't know how to describe him. I still remember when I went and watched him play when he was a junior, I told the coaches when I came back that I don't know what he is, but I love him. I had the opportunity to coach him with USA Basketball. He would've been one of the captains with our USA gold medal team. He kind of does a little bit of everything. He's a point guard. He's a five man for them at times. He's a four man. They post him up. He's one of the leading rebounders in the league. Then obviously you have Cade Cunningham, who I also had the opportunity to coach with USA Basketball. He's just a special talent, a lot of God given ability with his size and his body. He has a really good feel of the game. Between those two, you have to do a good job of limiting them. They're going to get some, but the other guys have all stepped up. Mike has them coming at you with a lot of different people and a lot of different looks. They will play several different defenses. They get you out of rhythm. I think it will be important for us to take care of the basketball, to box out because Cade and Isaac, they'll go get big rebounds on the offensive end at key times in the game along with their big guys. The twins are very athletic. They're 1-3, so obviously they'll be hungry. If you look at the games, TCU scored the last nine points to beat them at home. West Virginia they had by 17 or 19 in the second half, and West Virginia came back. Even Texas, they played really close. A mixture of a few older guys and a few younger guys and they come after you in a lot of different ways."
On Oklahoma State being picked seventh in the Big 12 with so much talent…
"I talked with Chris Beard the other night before the game. He just said, 'How have you done it and has it always been like this?' It's just so hard. It's unbelievable the talented athletes this year. It seems like the year of the freshmen, got a lot of good freshmen. You've got your older teams, the veterans. You've got great coaches, and it's tough. The league can eat you up very, very fast if you're not ready to play."
On how the team is handling the 1-3 conference start…
"I hope a little bit of everything. Obviously the frustration, the anger, the pride has to come out. We had a motivational guy this morning, and he talked a lot about being mission driven and the emotional and mental toughness you have to maintain. You're 1-3. A handful of possessions in several games could've made a difference, and some of those were emotional. Some of those were breakdowns, and some of them are toughness. All three of those, that mental, emotional and physical toughness are things that I think are easy to improve. They're right there for you. You can't just snap your fingers and think it's going to change. All practice today, we just talked about staying together, helping each other, being there for each other and making the most of the opportunities."
On if anyone on the team keeps the team loose and laughing…
"I think they all enjoy each other. Seryee (Lewis) is kind of silly. Davion (Bradford) is just a happy-go-lucky young man. I would really like Mike (McGuirl) and DaJuan (Gordon) just to smile and enjoy it. They want it so bad. I think in a way they've stressed themselves out. You've gotta prepare yourself. You gotta come with emotion. You gotta enjoy each other and be there for each other. That's the biggest thing, and that's an important part. They want to win. We had two guys crying on the bench on Tuesday night. We had a freshman hugging one and wiping his tears off. We had guys yesterday in our practice crying. I mean, they want to win. They want to do well. Nationwide, this has been a stressful 9-10 months for everybody when you throw in COVID. I've told our guys many times that I'm proud of them. We've had 12 games. We're going to play a 13th game tomorrow. There are teams that have played three games or four games. There are teams that haven't played in a month. I know we haven't had quite the results that we want, but they have gotten experience and they have gotten better. I hope they can reward themselves by enjoying it, enjoying the opportunities and making the most of it, smiling, and it can't just be when shots go in. They need to smile when they get a defensive stop, when someone makes a great pass. They gotta hug each other. It's so hard, because we discourage chest bumping. We discourage hugging. We discourage all that stuff, but some way we gotta figure out something to enjoy ourselves and be there for each other, including the coaches. We need to help them, because this is not easy."
On Mike McGuirl putting pressure on himself…
"I think so, and not only that. It's minutes, too. Our speaker this morning talked about when you fail or you don't have the discipline, when is it? Well, one of them is when you're tired. When you're asking Mike to play 38-39 minutes. He's had to handle the ball. He's had to distribute. He has to run off screens. He has to guard usually the best guy. It's hard, but we don't have a choice. The other night, we had foul trouble. We don't really have subs. I just asked him the other night, 'can I help you'? What can I do to help you? I know he cares. He had 12 on the play hard the other night and again his assist/turnovers. I'd like him to take a few better shots. I think he had eight rebounds maybe, so he's doing a lot of stuff. It was good to see Selton (Miguel) step up a little bit and Nijel (Pack) step up a little bit, maybe ease the burden on him and then he can relax, smile and enjoy it."
On Selton Miguel bouncing back…
"He struggled in back-to-back games. I know he had the game-winner against Omaha but if you look at the stats, he didn't have his better games. We put a couple plays in for him. Coach Southwell convinced me to give him the ball a little more. The first play of the game, we ran a play for him and he turned it over. I was like oh my goodness, I'm a dummy. But we went back to him, and he did make some plays. Maybe it will help him. The thing he has to do, he's gotta get some rebounds for us and get on that play hard chart. He's gotta do some of those other things so when his shot isn't going, he can still be productive. It's hard for young guys to understand that, because their whole life, they've had the ball and score but now it's different obviously at this level. That's why Isaac Likekele is such a good player, because he just wants to help the team win and does all the little things. I think DaJuan does those. That's our version of Isaac, but I think DaJuan sometimes wants to do more. Just be who you are. Selton is a very driven young man. He was on the radio show last night with us. Wyatt interviewed him. When you think of a young man that came to our country as a ninth grader and didn't know English and to get where he is now, not see his family and it's been now getting on 19 months. That is not easy, so he's a very driven young man. You gotta appreciate him and hope he'll continue to make strides which I know he will."
On how Mike McGuirl is handling being on a developing team…
"He's been great. He knew what we'd be in for. He wanted the challenge of trying to be a leader. I think if anything, like I talked about before, focus on leading and helping each other. If other guys play better, it eases the burden on him. In fact, he wants to do too much. I think some of his tough shot selection is because he's just trying to make a play. All the plays early in the game, we found a little niche on how to beat Texas Tech and he drove and made the skip pass. We made shots off of it. It was pretty simple basketball. Let it come. Let it come to you. Enjoy it, help your teammates and keep fighting."
On what it would mean for Mike to come back for another year…
"I'd love him back. I hope he comes back. He missed his freshman year. It would really be his senior year for him because you look at his minutes, I know he had some big moments in the NCAA Tournament but he didn't get the minutes he deserved. I hope he does. I hope he wants to be here. I hope our team continues to make progress where he wants to be a part of it and think we can move up in these league standings and battle to be in the top and battle for an NCAA bid."
On multiple guys leading the team in scoring this year…
"I hope so. We're probably not one-on-one guys with the age and understanding when to take a guy, but we pass the basketball pretty good and when we share it, I thought we did a good job. All the offensive stats against Texas Tech and some of the other games when we made those plays. As a staff, we're trying to help them. We spent more time on offense the last couple of weeks since we got back, trying to help them find ways to be successful. Each team is a little different. You have to adjust. I thought we did a good job against Texas Tech. TCU, after the beginning, I thought we started seeing some stuff. We just missed the shots. It's gotta continue tomorrow, because they're going to scramble and mix it up on you and you're going to have to make basketball plays. Tomorrow, it might be Rudi Williams hitting five threes from the corner or something. Hopefully that becomes a strength of us, our balance."
On an update on Montavious Murphy…
"From what I understand from his family and him, he made a decision to have a surgery, a procedure and that will be coming up fairly soon, probably the next week or so. That recovery is probably six weeks. He gave it a go, I mentioned the other night. Just didn't feel he could fight through the pain. Opportunity hopefully to come back pain free and come back and redo his sophomore year and come back better than ever."
On if Murphy will be available later this year…
"I think it would be a stretch. It's probably six weeks, so if he has his surgery in the next week you're pushing that last week of the season maybe. And that's being on the court, which again, he didn't play basketball for a month so he missed a whole month. He played for a week and now you're going to add another almost two months. It's going to be tough to come back, and I just think he wants to get that knee healthy so he feels like he's ready to go a year from now."
On the post situation with multiple guys being out…
"I really thought Carlton and Seryee the other day, their ball screen defense was probably the best it's been. We watched the tape, and they've had their struggles. Again, Carlton is a guy who hasn't practiced. Seryee has missed practice. It's all new to them, so we just gotta keep hanging with them. It puts a lot of pressure on Davion, playing 30 minutes. If we can get between those two guys around 14 minutes and keep Davion around 26 minutes or so, I think it really helps. I can't say enough about Davion. I've said it over and over. He's been my pleasant surprise of those young guys. People ask about silver linings. The silver lining of Kaosi getting hurt has definitely been that it's given Davion, Carlton and Seryee the opportunity to play. It's made it much tougher on us, but in the long run those guys are going to be much further along."
On the team starting better on the road than at home…
"It's something I talked about with our guys and something the motivational speaker talked about this morning. Complacency. You make mental mistakes when you get tired, when pressure gets to you and then when you take things for granted, you get complacent. I don't know when you're at home, you go on the road and don't have that fear and that tightness. We talked today and the players said that we have to deliver the first punch. We've done that on the road. Ironically, if you look at the Texas Tech and Iowa State games, very similar scores, like 7-6, 8-7, something like that and then first tv timeout. Made a run and got it to 17-10 against Texas Tech and got it up to nine or 10 against Iowa State. Iowa State, we were able to keep it going. Obviously we didn't do that against Texas Tech. They made a run. I talked to them about it several times. You've gotta have the emotion. We don't have the home crowd that you've had in the past. That emotion has to be there, and it can't just be on the road. It's gotta be at home, also. If you look at the league, I don't know where it is now. At one time, it was like 10-4 that the road teams have won. I'm not sure where it is now, but you can tell the crowd difference is really big."
On Luke Kasubke…
"He gives you a big guard and he's really known as a shooter, a guy that really understands the game. He comes from a really good program in Chaminade, had some high level guys coming through there. He led his team to the state final four last year, didn't get to finish it. But a young man that really understands the game. He's got a good body. He's put on weight strength. He can really shoot the ball, so a nice mixed player. It's going to take him a while. He hasn't played any live basketball and just got involved in some contact stuff in the past week. It's been since last March, so it will take him a little bit. I'm just happy for him that he's more involved. He was on scout squad today a little bit. It's been a long, long stretch for him, but he kept a great attitude. His family has been good. Hopefully he gets an opportunity to give us a little bit this season."
On cutting back on 3-pointers…
"It's a fine line, there's no doubt. We've talked about it. I've talked with other coaches about it. We've showed tape and will say, 'look, this is a contested one.' Look at the shot clock, it's 18 seconds. I don't think Mike is doing it selfishly. I think he just wants to help the team. For the most part, I thought most of our threes against Texas Tech were good ones, open ones. Obviously everybody takes tough ones in the game, but the more open ones we can work for and the more easy baskets we can get, it's obviously going to give us a boost of offense and hopefully success in the win column."
Players Mentioned
G
/ Men's Basketball
G
/ Men's Basketball
G
/ Men's Basketball
F
/ Men's Basketball
G
/ Men's BasketballK-State Men's Basketball | Postgame Press Conference at Texas Tech
Sunday, February 22
K-State Men's Basketball | Haggerty and Johnson Historic Night vs Baylor
Thursday, February 19
K-State Men's Basketball | Interim Head Coach Driscoll Press Conference vs Baylor
Wednesday, February 18
K-State Men's Basketball | Press Conference vs Baylor
Wednesday, February 18
