Bill Self emphasizes rivalry with Kansas State

Manhattan is the place to be this evening — and not the New York version. That’s right, Manhattan, Kansas, is the host of Tuesday’s premier college hoops matchup, as No. 2 Kansas visits No. 13 Kansas State for the most competitive edition of the Sunflower Showdown in quite some time. It’s been a while since both squads were ranked, and even longer since the Wildcats had such excitement surrounding their program.

Credit first-year head coach Jerome Tang for the turnaround. Bill Self certainly has a lot of respect for this year’s KSU team and knows they’ve already proven themselves against opponents of Kansas’ caliber.

“They’re capable of playing at a high level against anybody in the country and they’ve already shown they can do it,” Self said of the Wildcats. “It’s a rivalry game regardless if we’re both ranked or not. But certainly, I think it adds a lot more to it when both teams are good, and certainly both teams are good.”

As for for preparing for Kansas State, well, Kansas hasn’t really started game-planning yet. Heck, the team hasn’t even practiced since their game this past weekend.

“We haven’t even practiced yet, We were exhausted. We told them to get away from basketball (Sunday). We haven’t even talked about how we’re going to defend this or that yet.”

Bill Self admitted that the extra rest means cramming all of the pre-Kansas State work into a couple games, so he hopes his guys are able to understand the scouting report on the fly.

“For preparation, it needs to be a crash course and hopefully we’re able to pick up on some stuff,” Self said. “But I actually thought (resting) bodies (was) more important than preparation. And I’d be surprised if Jerome didn’t feel the same way. This league is such a grind.”

With Big 12 play posing daunting and extremely physical matchups on a nightly basis, Self says taking some time to get that extra rest can be more important than the practices they skip. We’ll see on Tuesday night whether the Jayhawks come out rusty or with an extra pep in their step.