K-State Basketball needs to take advantage of non-conference schedule

K-State basketball rolled to 2-0 on the young season after defeating the UMKC Roos 72-51 on Tuesday night. The Wildcats don’t begin conference play until December 29th and they need to take care of business in non-conference games.

This might seem like common sense, but it’s incredibly important for the Kansas State Wildcats to handle their non-conference opponents in 2017. Their first two opponents haven’t given them much trouble, but we saw the Wildcats hit a bit of a rough patch when the team hit conference play last year.

Their game against UMKC showed that K-State is capable of having big time performances, as four Wildcats had double digit points on the night. Barry Brown Jr. led the team with 14 points, followed by Xavier Sneed with 13, and Dean Wade and Mawdo Sallah both with 11 points.

Sallah led the Cats in rebounds with nine followed closely by Wade’s eight rebounds while Wade and Brown both had four assists each. It was a strong showing by the Cats, but can they continue their strong play?

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Preseason, the Wildcats were picked to finish eighth in the Big 12 Conference, which was a huge slap in the face after making it to the NCAA Tournament last season. This is just yet another thing that Kansas State will have to prove the naysayers wrong on.

Getting back to KSU’s upcoming schedule though, their next slate of games will come in the Las Vegas Invitational where they’ll see UC Irvine, Northern Arizona, and Arizona State over this next week.

Those games shouldn’t be too terribly difficult for K-State, but the December 3rd match-up against Vanderbilt is one to keep an eye on for sure. The Commodores made it to the NCAA Tournament last year and aren’t a team to sleep on by any means.

Kansas State isn’t like Kansas, who plays tougher schools in non-conference, because KU knows they have a good shot in those games. Those schools don’t gain anything from playing Kansas State. K-State basketball should obviously aim to get to that point, but for the time being, all they can do is play the teams on their schedule and win those games.

If the Kansas State Wildcats want to take the next step and be a legitimate force in Big 12 basketball, then they have to crush it during non-con play. They have a fairly light schedule, sans the Vanderbilt game, and if they play their cards right, the Wildcats could be undefeated when heading into Big 12 play come late December.

Don’t sleep on the Wildcats this year. They might not seem like a scary team, but the talent is certainly there.

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