Kansas State basketball 'shakes off cobwebs' in exhibition victory over Fort Hays State

Kansas State basketball ‘shakes off cobwebs’ in exhibition victory over Fort Hays State

Posted by Admin October 30, 2024 Basketball

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MANHATTAN — If Kansas State’s basketball team needed a reminder that exhibition games seldom are perfect, look no further than Wildcat forward Coleman Hawkins.

For Hawkins, a 6-foot-10 super-senior transfer from Illinois, just getting inside Bramlage Coliseum for Tuesday night’s game against Fort Hays State was a challenge.

“I didn’t know how to get through the back door,” Hawkins said with a smile after the Wildcats passed their lone exhibition test with a 70-56 victory over Division II Fort Hays before a crowd of 9,526. “I had to ride with coach (Rodney) Perry, and my apartment is literally right there (next to the arena), so that was the only struggle.”

Once inside the building, Hawkins showed the versatility that head coach Jerome Tang envisioned when signing him in the spring, stuffing the stat sheet in his 32 minutes of action.

“Man, he just does everything. Swiss Army knife, right?” Tang said of Hawkins, who finished with 13 points, seven rebounds, six assists, two steals and a blocked shot. “He does a lot of things to make the game easy for other people, and it’s just about us learning how to play with each other.

“That’s going to continue to help us, but he was a bright spot.”

As for Hawkins, other than the while back door thing, he enjoyed his first taste of Bramlage, even if the crowd wasn’t quite at its 11,010 capacity.

“It was cool,” Hawkins said. “I can’t wait until it fills up, but to see people lined up outside for an exhibition game is great.

“I think it was a great experience, and it was good to dust off the cobwebs and get the wheels turning a little and finally play in front of a crowd.”

The crowd saw far from a flawless performance from a K-State team that was overhauled during the offseason with just three players back from last year’s 19-15 team. The Wildcats shot just 41.1% from the floor, including 8 of 28 (28.6%) from 3-point range and let a 20-point second-half lead slip to 10 before settling down to close it out.

“It’s going to be a work in progress,” Tang said.

In addition to Hawkins, K-State got a game-high 15 points from Villanova transfer Brendan Hausen, all on five 3-pointers. Returning forward Macaleab Rich came off the bench to score 11 points and grab four rebounds in 20 minutes, while returning starter David N’Guessan had 10 points and nine rebounds.

“I thought Buddy (Rich) was good,” Tang said. “And Buddy got more minutes because Max (Jones) didn’t play, and Buddy showed that maybe we’ve got to find more minutes for him.

“We’ve got talent that’s going to take a while to figure everything out.”

Jones, a graduate transfer from Cal State Fullerton, did not play because of a minor toe injury, Tang said.

The Wildcats went with a starting lineup of Hawkins, Hausen, N’Guessan, (Illinois-Chicago transfer) C.J. Jones at point guard and Achor Achor (Samford transfer) up front. Jones had nine points and five assists, while Achor finished with seven points and four rebounds.

“I thought when we actually ran plays, we executed well,” Hawkins said. “I think we got the ball out quick, and I thought we pressured the ball decently.

“But that’s what these exhibition games are for. It wasn’t a lot of glamor, but we’ll clean things up and be ready to roll when it’s an official game.”

The first official game is at 7 p.m. next Tuesday, when the Wildcats play host to New Orleans.

Arne Green is based in Salina and covers Kansas State University sports for the Gannett network. He can be reached at agreen@gannett.com or on X (formerly Twitter) at @arnegreen.