Retrospective: KU Over Sam Houston St.

News, notes and quotes on KU’s 38-14 victory over Sam Houston State at Memorial Stadium Saturday night, while celebrating head coach Mark Mangino’s 40th win at KU. Mangino is the fourth coach in Kansas history to win 40 games at Mount Oread.

Also paying tribute to the defending NCAA basketball champions Kansas Jayhawks, who were honored after the first quarter on Kivisto Field. The biggest cheers came when Miracle Mario Chalmers game-tying three-pointer with 2.1 second left in regulation against Memphis in the title game was shown on the video board.
    
The Jayhawk fans hadn’t had much to cheer about until then with KU going scoreless in the first quarter (0-0). KU finally scored a touchdown at the 10:24 mark in the second quarter after Todd Reesing found the end zone on a quarterback keeper from the one-yard line.
    
*The home attendance (51,767) was the fourth-largest crowd school history.

*Junior running back Angus Quigley, sophomore defensive end Jake Laptad and junior receiver Raimond Pendleton all made their first career starts. Quigley rushed for a game-high 61 yards on a career-best 16 carries; Laptad had four tackles, including a sack; and Pendleton caught three passes for 26 yards.

*KU recorded its two longest pass plays of the season. Reesing threw a 68-yard touchdown pass to Kerry Meier in the second quarter (KU’s second-longest pass play in the last four years), and later hit Dezmon Briscoe for a 57-yard touchdown pass with 47 seconds remaining before halftime.

*Meier and Briscoe each had over 100 yards receiving (Meier caught eight passes for a career-high 136 yards and one touchdown; Briscoe had five receptions for 124 yards and a TD), marking the third straight game that KU featured two players with more than 100 receiving yards.

*The Jayhawks recorded three interceptions, doubling their season interceptions to six. Junior safeties Darrell Stuckey and Justin Thornton, and redshirt freshman cornerback Isiah Barfield recorded their first interceptions of the season. That was Barfield’s first career interception, and the third for Stuckey. Thornton’s interception was the seventh of his his career; he needs one more pick to tie Richard Bertuzzi for 10th place all time at KU.

*Reesing set a school record for most career 200-yard passing games with 14. He was 23 of 38 for 356 yards and two touchdowns. His 23 completions moved him into second-place all time at KU with 411... and his 38 pass attempts moved him into fifth place in KU history with 643.

*Junior college transfer Jocques Crawford rushed for his second major college touchdown (two-yard score at the 13:46 mark of the third quarter). Crawford had 19 rushing touchdowns last season (No. 2 in nation) at Cisco (Texas) Junior College. Crawford posted career highs with 12 carries for 43 yards, while splitting time with Quigley.

*KU now has a bye week before opening conference play at Iowa State on Oct. 4. The Cyclones (2-2) lost at UNLV in overtime tonight, 34-31. ISU quarterback Austen Arnaud completed 13 of 24 passes for two touchdowns, including the game-tying TD with three seconds left in regulation. He also rushed 10 times for 51 yards and two touchdowns.

The Cyclones opened the season with home victories over South Dakota State (44-17) and Kent State (48-28) before falling at Iowa (17-5) on Sept. 13.

Mangino is looking forward to the extra preparation this week.

“We need to work on fundamentals,” he said. “It will be a good week for that. We’ll focus on getting better. ...It’s for keeps in the conference.”

*KU basketball coach Bill Self was interviewed at halftime by Fox College Sports, which broadcasted the game. His 2007-08 Jayhawks received their championship rings on Friday night in a private ceremony in the Naismith Room in Allen Fieldhouse. Every player on last year’s team attended, except for Darrell Arthur, Russell Robinson and Sasha Kaun. Arthur had team commitments with the Memphis Grizzlies, while Robinson and Kaun and playing overseas.
    
A capacity crowd of approximately 100 people attended the ceremony, including former Jayhawk standouts Nick Collison, Kirk Hinrich, Jacque Vaughn and Wayne Simien.
    
"It was a pretty good evening that was special for our guys," Self said. “It was a very appreciative group of people tonight that were able to get their rings."
     
"We didn't ask a lot of ex-players, not out of disrespect, it was because we didn't have the room," Self added. "We wanted to get some guys back that were recent enough that our current players could identify with."