By Chuck Woodling, Tuesday, February 4, 1969
Box score: Kansas 64, Oklahoma State 48
It cost Ted Owens a pair of trousers, but Kansas recorded the 1,000th basketball victory in the school's history.
To borrow a phrase from football coach Pepper Rodgers, Owens and the Jayhawks turned Allen Fieldhouse into "Rip City" Monday night in disposing of Oklahoma State, 64-48, to reach the lofty plateau.
Prior to game time, the task appeared awesome. Jo Jo White was out of the lineup for the first time in three years. Greg Douglas, a 6-8 reserve forward, was declared scholastically ineligible hours before the contest. And Pierre Russell and Phil Harmon were unable to practice Sunday with leg injuries.
As it turned out, the only casualty were Owens' plaid trousers -- a victim of early second half bench-hopping. A white towel proved face-saving ... er, uh ... posterior-saving. It proved an unusual sight hanging down Owens' backside as he handed Chancellor W. Clarke Wescoe the game ball after it was all over.
"It (the tear) widened as the game went along," Owens said later. "Finally I had to go to the towel."
Based on their performance against the Cowboys, Russell and Harmon appeared as if Oral Roberts or some faith healer of that variety had worked wonders.
Both Russell, a 6-3 sophomore, and Harmon, a 6-4 senior, alternated in White's position. The two came up with 26 points between them.
Senior Bruce Sloan also performed ably as a part-time point man, finishing with 7 points.
Harmon, Owens explained, was supposed to do the lion's share of bringing the ball down, but the job was carried out mostly by Russell.
"Harmon," Owens pointed out, "had their quickest guy on him most of the time so we wanted to take him out of the point."
The strategy was to move the ball quickly around the outside, then get it inside to post men Roger Brown and Dave Robisch. And Robisch, the 6-9 soph who leads the Jays in scoring, frustrated OSU defenders all night in chalking up 23 points. In trying to defend him, all three of the 'Pokes' big men -- Charles Savell, Paul Mullen and Mike Tate -- fouled out.
"Robisch," Owens twinkled, "is pretty hard to cover."
More than anything, it was O-State's inability to get going that insured the victory. The Pokes scored only five points in the first 14 minutes. They went one eight-minute stretch without a field goal. KU led 29-18 at halftime.
Although White was missing, the Jayhawks didn't do anything new.
"It was the same offense we've been running all year," Owens said. "The key to our success was that we were revolving and running."
Poor free throw shooting, only 22 of 38 attempts, kept the game from being a runaway.
"We didn't shoot well either," Owens noted, "and I think that was because we were so juiced up. They really want the championship. I don't know if we'll get it, but they really want it."
The victory kept Kansas a half-game behind league-leading Colorado in the race for the title. CU is 5-1; KU, 5-2.
More important than winning 1,000 games and staying with Colorado, however, was the fact the Jayhawks proved they could win without White.
"We needed a confidence builder," admitted the KU coach. "We had overall good leadership and leadership is something we're going to have to share from now on."