FORT WORTH, Texas – Kansas big man Hunter Dickinson grabbed an offensive rebound and cradled the ball in his body with both arms, with no intention of letting TCU take it away from him.
Coach Bill Self wasn’t happy with how that play ended for his preseason AP All-America center, who never gave up when Trazarien White tried to take the ball away from him, even after the referees blew the whistle in the second half of the games. Jayhawks, ranked 12th. ’74-61 win at TCU.
“I thought it was silly for our guy to hold on to the ball like that,” Self said.
The 7-foot-2 Dickinson and the 6-foot-6 White remained tangled even as they stumbled out of bounds as the whistles blew to stop the action. TCU guard Vasean Allette and freshman Malick Diallo also got to the ball. Once Dickinson finally gave the ball away, the referees reviewed the play and assessed technical fouls on both him and White.
“That was a dumb play. But what made it a dumb play… when the whistle blows, you stop. And I’m sure they blew it several times,” Self said. “It cost us a possession, so yeah, I wasn’t happy to see that at all.”
The Horned Frogs had possession after the tie and White responded with an alley-oop dunk off a pass from Noah Reynolds with 12:44 left to put them up 48-47. That was the last time they led the game.
Dickinson, who finished with 16 points and a team-high nine rebounds, was not one of the players Kansas brought to the postgame interview.
TCU coach Jamie Dixon, who was on the opposite end of the court where the players tangled, had a much different reaction to the play than Self.
“I guess it didn’t matter,” said Dixon, who didn’t believe there was anything dirty or cruel about the play.
“I don’t even know what the T’s were for, but I guess the officials told them to stop,” he said. “They didn’t do what officials told them to do.”