Top-ranked Kansas survived back-to-back marquee matchups against North Carolina and Michigan State.
The Jayhawks’ reward?
A matchup with an Oakland program that made the Round of 32 last season.
It’s a much different Golden Grizzlies team than the darling of the NCAA Tournament with fearless sharpshooter Jack Goehlke off and graduated and 2023-24 leading scorer Trey Townsend wearing an Arizona uniform.
The program still is led by mainstay Greg Kampe, who took over the Golden Grizzlies in 1984 and currently is the longest tenured coach in Division I. He became the 10th active coach to win 700 career games in Oakland’s season-opening win over Division III foe Defiance.
“I came here at 28 years old thinking that I was the greatest coach in the history of coaches and that I would win 50 national championships and be the next John Wooden and all that kind of stuff,” Kampe said. “It didn’t take long to find out that I don’t know very much. I’ve been blessed that we were able to recruit great, great players and I’ve been fortunate to work with great people.”
Oakland’s current road swing included a stop in Champaign, Ill., to face a talented and youthful Illinois team that needed well into the second half to put the Golden Grizzlies away.
Two returning seniors lead Oakland. DQ Cole and Tuburu Naivalurua are driving an offense that depends on effort and outside shooting. Cole is averaging 10.7 points per game, while Naivalurua is averaging 10.3 points and 7.7 rebounds.
Cole started 21 games for Oakland last season, including both NCAA Tournament games. Naivalurua saw significantly less action off the bench but still had a minor role in the rotation.
Kansas operates in a different reality.
The Jayhawks have a roster filled with high-end transfers and coveted recruits. That includes their best players, Michigan transfer and second-year Kansas center Hunter Dickinson, who was second on the team in scoring with 17.1 points per game last season. He also led the team with 10.9 rebounds.
Dickinson is up to 21.3 points per game this season and dropped 28 on old Big Ten foe Michigan State on Tuesday night. The offense has more bite and Dickinson has a sidekick in South Dakota State transfer Zeke Mayo. He’s second on the team in scoring, averaging 15.3 points per game.
Head coach Bill Self was especially impressed with Mayo’s 21-point performance in the win over North Carolina last Friday.
“He met (his moment) with flying colors,” Self said. “He was great, he was fantastic. He made a couple of plays off the bounce that were huge. He was great, and we needed everything.”
Returning starters KJ Adams and Dajuan Harris are averaging over nine points per game. Harris started in all 34 games last season and averaged 8.5 points.
Adams started 32 games and averaged 10.6 points per game, down from 12.6 per game in his sophomore season.
Oakland enters Saturday’s game coming off a 12-point loss to Illinois, an improvement from the 44-point loss at Boise State that had Lampe lit up.
–Field Level Media
