Wild brawl mars Kansas win
LAWRENCE, Kan. — Third-ranked Kansas and Kansas State ended their bitter showdown Tuesday night with a wild melee in the disabled seating behind the Wildcats' basket that included punches, shoving and at least one player threatening to swing a stool.
The Jayhawks were dribbling out the time on their 81-60 victory when Silvio De Sousa was stripped by DaJuan Gordon near mid-court. Gordon tried to go for a layup and De Sousa recovered to block his shot and send the freshman sprawling, then stood over the freshman and barked at him — triggering both benches to empty into what amounted to a rugby scrum.
At one point, De Sousa picked up a stool and held it over his head before Kansas assistant Jerrance Howard grabbed it from him from behind. The Jayhawks' Marcus Garrett and David McCormick were also in the thick of the scrum along with the Wildcats' James Love and David Sloan, who was the first player to come to Gordon's defense.
It took both coaching staffs, the officials and Allen Fieldhouse security to separate the teams.
“Without knowing exactly everything that went down, it was obvious to me that we played a role in what transpired and there will be penalties for that,” said Jayhawks coach Bill Self, who was already shaking hands with Kansas State counterpart Bruce Weber when the chaos erupted. “I need to see the film to comment or have any definitive thoughts on exactly why or how it got started.”
Then, adding to the bizarre finish, five players from each team were summoned back from the locker rooms by officials and one-tenth of a second was put on the clock. Kansas State shot technical free throws to booing from a few thousand fans.
The reason only those players returned? The rest of the players from each team — including those dressed in street clothes — were ejected because they had left the bench while the game was in progress.
Weber had instructed his players to back off in the closing seconds and let the game run out. And while Self said he didn't agree with the steal and layup attempt, he did acknowledge that Kansas State was merely playing to the final whistle.