Mar 14, 2024; Kansas City, MO, USA; Iowa State Cyclones forward Robert Jones (12) celebrates after a made basket against the Kansas State Wildcats during the second half at T-Mobile Center. Mandatory Credit: Amy Kontras-USA TODAY Sports
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Robert Jones left the court last Saturday at Kansas State with a gnawing feeling in his gut.
The trademark “energy” the senior Iowa State center exudes every time he takes the floor hadn’t been fully tapped. And the result that day — a 65-58 loss to the Wildcats — caused him to reflect, refocus and fully recharge for the Big 12 Tournament and Thursday night’s eventual rematch in the quarterfinals.
“I just feel like I owed (more),” said Jones, who erupted for a conference career-high 18 points as the second-seeded Cyclones surged past Kansas State, 76-57, at the T-Mobile Center. “I came out and played a less physical game than I’m used to playing (on Saturday) and didn’t score the ball as well. I mean, I had three points on Saturday, so I knew coming into this game I was gonna give them the best version of myself and that’s what I did tonight.”
The rest of the seventh-ranked Cyclones (25-7) followed suit, scoring their most points in nearly a month to advance to a semifinal matchup with the winner of Thursday’s late quarterfinal between third-seeded Baylor and 11th-seeded Cincinnati. Fellow senior forward Tre King added 16 points, junior guard Keshon Gilbert chipped in 12 and sophomore guard Tamin Lipsey contributed 11 as ISU used a 9-0 run midway through the second half to turn a five-point lead into a 14-point cushion. The key to that decisive stretch? Defense, as usual. The Cyclones forced three of the Wildcats’ 20 turnovers during that span and scored two points off of each of those miscues.
“We know as long as we do what we do and focus on the things we do well we can beat anybody,” said King, who grabbed a game-high nine rebounds while snaring three steals. “I feel like up to this point we’ve shown that we can do that. So I think that we have found our confidence in that and once we got in that huddle and looked at each other, it was like, ‘Ok, they made their run. We know basketball’s a game of runs, but it’s over now.’ So we made that up in your mind and you saw what happened.”
Gilbert made several crucial plays during ISU’s big splurge. He finished with a game-high six steals — a new program record in Big 12 Tournament play — and dished out a game-high five assists.
“I gotta shout out Keshon Gilbert, number 10,” said senior guard Curtis Jones, who saw his string of 14 consecutive games scoring in double figures off the bench snapped. “He just played a really good game. The whole team played a good game. We weren’t going to lose this game.”
Especially given what happened Saturday in Manhattan, where the Cyclones collectively felt they lacked the level of focus necessary to win in the pivotal month of March.
“We are very direct and we tell them the truth, and Saturday was not the standard,” ISU head coach T.J. Otzelberger said. “We don’t positive coach. We don’t negative coach. We coach them honestly and that wasn’t our standard, and we wanted to get back to who we are and playing the way that we’ve played all year, so hopefully a lesson learned and now we know moving forward especially how we need to focus on playing on both ends.”
That’s with purpose. Toughness. An aggressive mentality that never falters, particularly on defense. In other words: Energy. Robert Jones provided a surplus of it Thursday night and that bodes well for both the remainder of this tournament and the NCAA Tournament that follows.
“Rob was tremendous,” Otzelberger said. “He didn’t feel great about his performance on Saturday. He was unbelievable in his preparation. You could tell it was important to him to come out and play great. He set the tone from the opening jump and I think he was the guy that clearly was the most physical, prideful player in terms of wanting to win that game here today.”
